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A RELIGIOUS JOURNEY IN THE EAST 



IN 1850 AND 1851. 



6 



BY THE ABBE DE ST. MICHON. 

; A — 




LONDON : 

EICHAKD BENTLEY, NEW BURLINGTON STREET, 
JjttJjIis{j*r in #rbhrarg to Jst Ulajeatg. 
1853. 



/ 

LONDON : 
HARRISON AND SONS, PRINTERS, 
ST. MARTIN'S LANE. 



CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER I. 

Page 

Troubles of an Author. — Earewell to Home. — My 
Colleague. — French Protestantism. — The Reformed 
Church. — The Eastern Church. — Memorial to the 
Pope.— Bossuet's Plan. — Dangers of Delay. — Errors 
of Reason. — The Anglican Converts. — "Weakness of 
Eastern Church. — Difficulties of Reconciliation. — 
Preparations for the Journey. — My Eellow-travellers 1 

CHAPTER II. 

Berlin. — The Egyptian Museum. — The Anglican Move- 
ment. — Breslau. — Silesia. — Fortifications of Vienna. 
— Laybach. — Grlognitz — Legitimacy and Religion. — 
The Count de Chambord. — Outskirts of Europe. — 
Illyria and Carniola. — Eirst View of the Mediterra- 
nean. — The G-ulf of Mu'ia. — The old Roman Blood. 
— The Archduchess Sophia. — Arrival at Corfu . . 25 

CHAPTER III. 

Corfu; its Ramparts. — The 'Governor's Palace. — A 
Night on Deck. — Ocupations on Board. — Botanical 
Pleasures. — Island of Sapienza. — Syra. — Our Drago- 
man. — The Archipelago. — Historical Associations. — 
Eirst View of Athens. — A Greek Khan. — Temple 
of Theseus.— Hotel d' Orient,— The Propyhea.— The 
Parthenon .. ... .. .. .. ..50 



VI 



CONTENTS. 



CHAPTEE IV. 

Page 

Early Churches. — Gothic Cathedrals. — Christian Art. 
— Allegorical Decorations. — The Metopes. — Mar- 
hies of Greece. — Microscopic Vegetation. — The Sa- 
cred Eoad. — The Athenian Mountains. — Church of 
Daphni. — Early Architecture. — Dukes of Athens. — 
The Marquess of Montserrat. — Athens by Moonlight. 
— The Catholics of Athens. — Military Eete. — Patriot- 
ism of the Clergy . . . . . . . . 73 

CHAPTEE V. 

The Ilissus. — Convent of Penteli. — Marbles of Paros. 
— The Cephisus. — Our Guide Antonio. — Gulf of Sa- 
lamis. — Eleusis. — Pass of Kaki Skala. — Isthmus of 
Corinth. — The Isthmian Games. — Eountain of Venus. 
— Acro-Corinthus.- — -Euins of Mycenae. — Tomb of 
Atreus. — The Gate of Lions. — Cyclopean Walls. — 
Tirynthus. — Nauplia. — Eirst Greek Parliament.— 
Marshes of Lerna . . . . . . . . 95 

dHAPTEE VI. 

Saranta-Potamos. — Khan of Krarata. — Mount Tay- 
getus. — The Elver Eurotas. — Tomb of Leonidas. — 
Sparta. — Habits of the Greeks. — Mistra, — A Greek 
Election. — Valley of the Eurotas. — Encampment of 
Eeapers. — Eeturn to Lontari. — The Greek Services. 
— Plan of the Churches. — Singular Bridge. — Mount 
Ithome. — Messene. — Eountain of Clepsydra. — Tem- 
ple of Jupiter .. * .. ..122 

CHAPTEE VII. 

Ascent of Ithome. — The Eecluse's Dwelling. — Dan- 
gerous Descent. — Eountain of Mandra. — Dangerous 
Ford. — Apollo the Epicurean.— A Country Priest 
and his Household. — Valley of the Alpheus. — Castle 
of Lala. — Greek Agriculture. — The Eig and Olive. 
—The Native Plough.— Distillation of Eaki.— Tri- 
potamo. — Temple of iEscnlapius. — Convent of St. 
Laura . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 147 



CONTENTS. 



Vll 



CHAPTER VIII. 

Page 

Kalavrita. — Megaspilon. — Monachism in the East. — 
Ignorance of the Monks. — Monastic Prejudices. — 
Decay of the Monks' influence. — Fertility of the 
Valley.— Turkish Habits.— Want of Bridges.— Gulf 
of Lepanto. — " Le Prophete Elie." — A Storm in the 
Gulf. — Our Alarm. — Loutraki. — Salamis and iEgina. 
Clerical Influence. — Necessity of Union. — State of 
the Greek Church 173 

CHAPTER IX. 

The Old and New Cathedrals at Athens. — Greek Reli- 
gious Art. — The Basilica. — The Chancel Veil. — 
Gothic Architecture. — Inductive Ornament. — Pic- 
ture AVorship. — Absence of Images. — Diptychs. — 
Figures of the Virgin. — Eorm of the Churches. — 
The Royal Palace and its Gardens. — National Habits. 
— The Greek Races. — We are Robbed . . . . 202 

CHAPTER X. 

The Priest's Benediction. — The Bishop of Syra. — The 
Abbe Marinelli. — Decline of Catholicism. — The 
Clergy of Naxia. — Catholics of Greece. — "Want of 
Literature. — Absence of Schools. — Greek Fanata- 
cism. — The proposed Council. — Necessity of Action. 
— We reach Asia. — The Oriental Race. — The Bridge 
of Caravans. — The River Meles. — Hideous Black . . 228 

CHAPTER XI. 

The Dardanelles — The Bosphorus. — Splendid Prospect. 
— Constantinople. — The Mnezzin. — Galata. — The 
Archbishop of Pera and his Clergy. — The Armenians. 
The Patriarch Salviani. — Father Ventura. — The Laza- 
rists. — Revolt of Aleppo. — Decay of Turkey. — St. 
Sophia. — Present State of the Turks . . . . . . 254 

CHAPTER XII. 

The Armenians. — Mons. Tchamourdjan. — Council of 
Florence. — The Procession of the Son. — Catholic 



Vlll 



CONTENTS. 



Doctrine. — The Armenian College. — Scutari. — The 
Bosphorus. — The Caiques. — The Grreek Patriarch. — 
Intriguing Spirit. — Theological Studies. — Catholic 
Priests. — Religious Dissensions. — Visit to St. Sophia. 
The Great Porch.— Porphyry Columns. — Ancient 
Mosaics ' 277 

CHAPTER XIII. 

Byzantine Art. — Language of Signs. — Mahomedan 
Taste. — The Lazarist Fathers. — Eastern Eamilies. — 
Rhodes.— The Knights of St. John.— The Holy Land. 
— Beyrout. — Curious Mosaic. — Our Comnanions. — 
Distant View of Lebanon. — Khan of El Kalda. — 
Sarcophagi. — Itinerary of Jerusalem. — River Da- 
mour.— Sidom— The Latin Church 307 

CHAPTER XIY. 

Am El Qantarah. — Sarepta. — Necropolis of Adloun. — 
Extent of Cemeteries. — Antique Tower. — The 
Ancient Leontes. — Arrival of Pilgrims. — Ain El 
Barouk. — Ruins of Tyre. — Cathedral of Tyre. — Coast 
Scenery. — Solomon's Pool. — Serious Accident. — 
Omm - el-'Amia. — Beautiful Ruins. — Phoenician 
Houses. — El Bassa. — Franciscan Monks. — St. Jean 
d'Acre. — Recollections of the Past. — To-morrow ! — 
Anticipated Joys . . . . . . . . . . 334 



Appendix . 



360 



A RELIGIOUS JOURNEY 
IN THE EAST. 



CHAPTER I. 

Troubles of an Author. — Farewell to Home. — My Colleague. 
— French Protestantism. — The Beformed Church. — The 
Eastern Church. — Memorial to the Pope. — Bossuet's 
Plan. — Dangers of Delay. — Errors of Reason. — The 
Anglican Converts. — "Weakness of the Eastern Church. — 
Difficulties of Eeconciliation. — Preparations for the 
Journey. — My Fellow-travellers. 

September 21, 1850. — I quitted Montausier 
with an undefinable feeling of calm sadness, 
mingled with regrets and hopes. A new phase 
of my life was commencing. I was about to 
visit the East, not for the ordinary gratification 
of travelling, but to realise a plan conceived 
long years ago — co give myself up to the serious 
study of one of the most important questions 
that can be entertained in these times. 

On my return, should Providence restore me 
to my country, with the rich reward of my con- 
scientious researches, I shall write the account 

B 

A 



2 



TROUBLES OF AN AUTHOR. 



of my travels, and consequently bring myself 
before the notice of the religious world, although 
I may thereby expose myself to injustice or 
hatred ; and I shall renounce for ever this ob- 
scure existence, full of charm though it be to 
me, and of which I enjoy the peace all the 
more now, because I have the better presenti- 
ment of the troubles and vexations which attend 
every author, when he leaves the beaten track 
of received ideas and prejudices of his times. 

I thought how delightful it would be never 
to leave my solitude ; to let my life pass away 
without asking of the world aught that is called 
fame. If I had only listened to the dictates 
of my heart, or rather to idleness, I should 
have bid a final adieu to every hope of literary 
renown. 

To live to God, to nature, and to myself; to 
temper my solitude with the sweet affections of 
my family, and with the strong sympathies of 
friendship, would constitute all my happiness 
in this short-lived existence. Aspirations after 
God — the great Christian idea on which our 
salvation is based, would be far more easy in 
my hermitage than in the midst of the turmoil 
of the world. I only accept this last condition 
of life because it is imposed upon me by Provi- 
dence ; we must learn to bend ourselves to its 
duties, and walk straight in the path which it 



FAREWELL TO HOME. 



3 



points out to us, though we may fear its dan- 
gers and fatigues. 

Before leaving my little domain, I traversed 
it with fond affection. Would it be granted 
to me to revisit it? to fill it with oriental plants, 
as I had already done with those from the 
Pyrenees. Should I have the joy of construct- 
ing a second Sepulchre and another Calvary, in 
remembrance of that Calvary and that Sepul- 
chre where I should have bowed my head and 
celebrated its wonderful mysteries ? 

I deserved not such happiness as this at the 
hand of God. 

This adieu might be a final one. I gave a 
parting look at my trellices laden with vines, 
which seemed to reproach me for leaving them, 
when they were ripening for me beneath the 
sun's rays. I bid adieu to each of my pretty 
greenhouse plants, memorials either of gratitude 
or friendship ; I watered for the last time my 
plants from the Pyrenees ; I went to take a 
last look at the basin, the kitchen-garden, the 
orchard, and the fountain ; I closed the gate 
behind me ; and after the parting embrace of 
my family, by whom I am tenderly loved, I set 
out. 

I arrived at Paris on the 23rd of September, 
1850. My kind friend M. de Saulcy, was 
expecting me. I owe to his high-minded gene- 

b 2 



4 



MY COLLEAGUE. 



rosity ray bright pilgrimage to the ancient 
world. I have known few men with a warmer 
heart or a nobler soul. I had every advantage 
to gain from him as a scholar ; he had nothing 
to hope from me in return, but unbounded 
gratitude and devotedness. 

M. de Saulcy had obtained from Government 
a scientific mission. He was willing to associate 
me in his labours ; and it was agreed that 
during his researches in geography and archae- 
ology, I should make the herbarium of the ex- 
pedition. Thus, each of us would be able on 
our return to make some offering to our coun- 
try. I acquitted myself of the task assigned 
me with an interest which had not subsided 
when we returned to the long -wished - for 
shores of France, off Marseilles ; and which 
made me brave the quarantine in the island of 
Pomegue, as it had given me courage to brave 
the musket of the Greek on the slopes of Tay- 
getus, and of the Arab on the heights of 
Carrnel. 

My journey had only for its object the re- 
searches of science and the charms of a holy 
pilgrimage. I wished above all things to make 
it useful to the church, by a conscientious 
investigation of the religious state of the East. 
For some years, the great question of the re- 
union of the churches dissenting from Catho- 



FRENCH PROTESTANTISM. 



5 



licity, which had been abandoned since the days 
of Bossuet, Molanus, and Leibnitz, had been 
to me a subject of careful study. I viewed the 
religious movement in England as a presage of 
the restoration of one of the nations which has 
the most influence upon the world's destinies. 
I knew that Germany would soon join in the 
same movement. Long reflection had shown 
me that the general reconciliation of the Chris- 
tian communions was the legitimate act of 
reparation, which in our times should wipe out 
the stain of three centuries of religious hatred 
and unsuccessful struggles. 

Whenever Providence has afforded me the 
opportunity of an interview with the ministers 
of the Reformed church of France, or with 
distinguished men of that communion, I have 
taken advantage of it as a means of informing 
myself as to the state of feeling existing in 
that church. Although she forms, from the 
small number of souls of which she is composed, 
only a feeble minority, nevertheless, disseminated 
in the heart of France, and dominant in several 
cantons of Switzerland, her return to unity 
would be a magnificent example, which would 
soon be followed by other communions separated 
from Borne by less marked differences. 

These interviews, rare though they have 
been, have not failed to convince me that the 







THE REFORMED CHURCH. 



moment has arrived even for the Reformed 
churches of France. I discovered that they 
had long repudiated the fatalist theory of 
Calvin, on the indefectibility of grace, and a 
number of other points of peculiar theology 
which he has developed in his famous book 
of the " Christian Institutes." 

Intelligent men of the Reformed church, with 
whom I treated upon the possibility of a re- 
union, never saw insurmountable obstacles to it. 
They saw with me that time had done its work ; 
that more than one long century of indifference, 
in which the spirits of men were lulled by the 
illusions of philosophy, had extinguished all the 
ardour of those theological contests regarding 
grace and free-will, in which our fathers had 
expended so much bitterness. Divested now 
of all political character, not mixing itself up 
with the claim of preponderance of the Euro- 
pean states, and being no longer able to change 
their equihbrium, the question, reduced to its 
true character, that is to say, a religious discus- 
sion upon religious interests, would infallibly 
ensure a pacific solution, or would be carried 
forward on each side with all the concessions 
compatible with the integrity of the doctrines 
and the imprescriptible rights and authority of 
the church in matters of faith. 

It was easy to discover (and it is not one of 



CONFLICTING IDEAS. 



7 



the least interesting lessons derived from similar 
studies) that the clergy of the Reformed church, 
who are the most difficult to bring to a system 
of conciliation, are men of weak and narrow 
niinds, who regard as an established dogma the 
exclusion from salvation of all without the pale 
of the Reformed church, and practise themselves 
the intolerance with which they reproach the 
Roman Catholics ; whilst others, brought up with 
the more enlarged ideas of the times, feel to- 
wards the Romish church none of that rancorous 
antipathy which has for such a length of time 
prolonged their sad separation. By the same 
analysis of the human passions, I have found, in 
the bosom of the Catholic church, a large body 
of men who would willingly anathematise every 
attempt at reconciliation with dissenting com- 
munions, unless humbled and vanquished, and 
extended on the bed of Procrustes, to be shorn 
and fashioned after the model of the middle ages; 
by which they would deprive Catholicism of the 
powers of motion. 

Full of hope upon the subject of Protestant- 
ism, which withholds from unity so large a portion 
of Europe, I was not less sanguine as to the 
favourable moment for reconciling the orthodox 
church of the East with the Romish church. 

This reunion had already been once solemnly 
proclaimed at the decline of the middle ages, at 



8 



THE EASTERN CHURCH. 



a time when religious antipathies were still in 
all their vigour. In studying the history of the 
church, it was easy to discover the secret of the 
disastrous rupture which so speedily followed this 
reconciliation. I thought that if it was possible 
to take up, in the nineteenth century, the work 
of Bossuet for the Reformed church of Europe, 
it was not more difficult to resume that of the 
Council of Florence for the Oriental church. 

My journey with M. de Saulcy, during which 
we should have occasion to visit Athens, Con- 
stantinople, Smyrna, Damascus, Jerusalem, and 
Lebanon, would be a favourable opportunity 
for forming a decided opinion upon this im- 
portant question ; and it would be the more 
interesting from the fact that, not having any 
official mission to the patriarchs and bishops of 
the East, my researches and the development of 
my ideas and of my plan would not awaken the 
habitual suspicion of rival churches. 

Before setting out, I wished to ask the benedic- 
tion upon my labours of the common Father of the 
Faithful. Since his accession to the papacy, Pius 
IX had entered into a correspondence with the 
patriarchs of the Greek and Armenian churches. 
This attempt had failed. I shall explain the 
reason why the result was so unfortunate. I was 
convinced that such an important enterprise ought 
not to be abandoned in consequence of a first 



MEMORIAL TO THE POPE. 



9 



failure, the motives of which it would be easy 
to discover upon the spot. 

I addressed from Paris a memorial to his 
Holiness, short and comprehensive, in which I 
stated my thoughts, and the objects of my 
religious researches. Monseigneur the Nuncio 
Fornari, who was about to be raised to the 
dignity of a cardinal, granted me an audience, in 
which he listened to the details of my plan 
with the kindest cordiality. He entreated me 
to devote the journey I had in contemplation to 
the service of religion, and he promised to pre- 
sent to the Sovereign Pontiff the memorial which 
I had drawn up. He dwelt much upon the 
interest felt by the Church of Rome as to the 
reunion of dissenting communions, He told me 
that there was no work more deserving of the 
protection and paternal support of the Pope than 
that to which I was about to devote my efforts. 

The memorial expressed that one of the greatest 
calamities that could befal the church was the 
separation of a large number of her children ; 
that in all times her voice of lamentation had 
been heard when a link in her chain of unity 
had been broken, and the seamless robe of the 
spouse of Christ had been rent. 

" The church," I said, " does not rest con- 
tented with regrets and complaints; her maternal 
heart has made her seize, with tender eagerness, 



10 



bossuet's plan. 



every opportunity of bringing back within her 
bosom the estranged Christian nations. There 
are no pages of the church's history more in- 
teresting than those which recal, with minute 
detail, her efforts and also her advances towards 
the separate communions, inviting them to ami- 
cable discussions, and to conferences by the 
aid of councils, in the hope that light would 
shine forth in the understandings of the sin- 
cere, and so prepare them for reunion with 
the mother-church." 

Without too much detail as to the history of 
the past, the memorial recalled the joy of the 
Church when Bohemia renounced the errors 
which had crept into her bosom ; when the 
Council of Florence had sealed the union of the 
Greek church to that of Rome. It said, that 
in the seventeenth century, after the long strug- 
gles of Protestantism, one of the glories of 
Bossuet had been to prepare, with the learned 
men of Germany, a plan for the reunion of the 
Lutheran and Catholic churches, — a plan which 
did not then succeed, because too much bit- 
terness still existed, and that Protestantism had 
not stood the test of time. Lastly, in our days, 
Catholicism, depressed by the infidelity of the 
age, had experienced a happy reaction, when it 
was stated by the public journals that in England, 
men distinguished by sound sense had had the 



NECESSITY OF UNITY. 



11 



courage to abjure their church, and had come 
back to the faith of their fathers. It became, 
therefore, of immense importance to the church 
no longer to have excluded from the centre of 
unity a part of the East, all the north of Europe, 
North America,— more than half the civilized 
world, — whole nations rendered powerful and 
distinguished by genius and science, and by 
their progress in arts and industry. It was 
apparent, also, that in Europe men's minds had 
been struck by the numerical weakness of Catho- 
licism, from which they prognosticated its fall ; 
and people were not afraid to say aloud, and 
to publish, that, mutilated for several centuries, 
losing each day from within her own pale a 
large number of her children, who abandon the 
faith, and take refuge in a vague deism, that 
Catholicism would soon disappear, like those 
ancient creeds which have not survived their 
temples, from the day when reason had un- 
masked their extravagance and imposture. 

" His Holiness Pius IX," said the memorial, 
" who more than any one in the Catholic world 
has mourned over this isolation, and deplored 
the sad tendency of an age which every day 
departs more and more from the faith, compre- 
hends what happiness it would be for the uni- 
versal church, what a triumph for the doctrines 
of which she is the sacred depository, what glory 



12 



DANGERS OF DELAY. 



for a pontificate of which the commencement 
has given birth to so many hopes, if the reunion 
of Christian communion were prepared, if not 
completed, by its high initiative." 

In the opinion of some serious minds which 
give themselves up to this religious question, the 
hour has come to labour hard at this work of 
reconciliation. To defer, for only a few years, the 
attempt, might be seriously to peril its success. 
The sixteenth century stands forth to attest how 
fatal to the interest of the church was the delay 
in assembling the Council of Trent. When it 
did meet, it found nothing but ruins. The sepa- 
ration, which it would have been easy to have 
arrested in time, was completed ; and notwith- 
standing its zeal and the wisdom of its decrees, 
it left imperfect the task for which the wisest, 
gravest, and holiest men, had with such earnest- 
ness demanded its convocation. 

His Holiness, who knows the whole extent of 
the evils with which the church is afflicted, is 
perfectly aware that, for more than a century, 
infidelity, which distinctly denies the restoration 
of the world by Christianity, has penetrated into 
all ranks of society. More to be dreaded than 
heresy, it retains nothing of the Gospel but that 
sweet and holy morality, which, however, has 
found favour in its eyes. 

Unbelief has gone so far, that it has called 



ERRORS OF REASON. 



13 



forth against it the zeal of the bishops and 
ministers of the separated communions, which 
have preserved the fundamental doctrines of 
Christianity. They have loudly declared that 
the tendency of unaided human reason is to 
shake off the yoke of faith, and have trembled 
like ourselves for that Gospel whose divine words 
they venerate. 

Providence has called them to unite their 
efforts to those of the true church, to defend 
from unbelief what the church defends, and to 
repudiate what she rejects. This necessity for 
the union of all the communions separated from 
Rome to unite with Rome for the safeguard of 
the great principles of the faith, seems a provi- 
dential preparation for bringing about the defi- 
nitive reconciliation of the Christian family, 
which has for so many centuries lived in reli- 
gious hatred. They comprehend in this day the 
disastrous consequences of the loss of unity ; and 
they do not conceal that the reformers of the 
sixteenth century, in rejecting the authority of 
the church to replace it by private judgment, 
have carried into religious communities the prin- 
ciple of certain dissolution. Less impassioned 
in these times, free from the hatreds which 
become fanaticism in religious struggles, they 
pronounce maledictions against those ardent men 
who urged on society too far in the sixteenth 



14 



THE ANGLICAN CONVERTS. 



century ; they have only painful recollections of 
theni, and unhesitatingly cast upon them the 
misfortunes which have oppressed the Christian 
world. 

The numerous conversions of enlightened men 
of the Anglican church are facts which need no 
comment, to prove the tendency of that dis- 
tinguished and intelligent nation, to retun to 
the bosom of Catholicism. 

It is also certain, that in France, when our 
Catholic priests enter into amicable discussions 
with the ministers of the Reformed church, 
those last do not conceal their wish for the re- 
union of the two churches. They acknowledge 
that Protestantism, torn by the principle of the 
authority of private judgment, deprived of the 
strength that all doctrines derive from the prin- 
ciple of unity, has no security but in seeking 
this principle where it is found, — in that church 
which has preserved it. They are also aware 
that their reunion with Eome would be preferred 
with that consideration, — with all those delicate 
precautions which would deprive ifc of all ap- 
pearance of humiliation ; and that the church, in 
her language, would in no way wound the feel- 
ings of men over whose estrangement she sighs, 
and whose souls seem most dear to her ; and 
that further, according to what Bossuet has pro- 
nounced, the church, in everything concerning 



WEAKNESS OF THE EASTERN CHURCH. 15 

discipline, would not constrain the habits and 
religious customs of Christian nations disposed 
to reunion, provided that upon points of doc- 
trine, and the recognition of the authority of the 
church, their adhesion was sincere. 

After these observations upon Protestantism, 
the memorial continued as follows : — - 

" These are the facts upon which are founded 
our hopes of the reunion of Christian commu- 
nions separated from Home since the sixteenth 
century^ It therefore follows that an oecu- 
menical council would easily remove the obstacles 
which have hitherto impeded so important a 
work j and would tend to accomplish a recon- 
ciliation destined 'to give so much splendour to 
the church of Christ. 

" On the other hand, the East, separated for 
a still longer period, is languishing from day to 
day, without strength and without life, deprived 
of the energy which is at once given by au- 
thority and unity. The doctrinal points at issue 
between the two churches are so easy to clear 
up, that in them lie the least obstacles to a re- 
union. But the old prejudices of religious ani- 
mosities which amount to fanaticism, and an 
ignorance of which it is difficult to form an 
idea, require great judgment in approaching the 
subject. It will require slow and well-con- 
sidered preliminaries, not to wound their sus- 



16 DIFFICULTIES OF RECONCILIATION. 

ceptibilities so long kept up by old antipathies. 
By wise precautions in carrying forward nego- 
tiations, the work of the council of Florence 
may be resumed. It is impossible that the 
great Eastern churches should be fallen so low 
that they have not still some Bessarions suffi- 
ciently intelligent and upright to recognise the 
truth, and to co-operate with ardour in the 
reunion of these two churches. 

" As this reconciliation cannot be made with- 
out great caution, and the careful preparation of 
men's minds, it is desirable that those animated 
by the sincere wish of saving this noble cause 
should communicate with eminent men of the 
estranged communions, to sound them, and to 
suggest to them the immense advantages of this 
reunion, so that it is possible to combat revived 
prejudices, and to weaken antipathies which 
have their origin only in national pride." 

The memorial expressed that, having to visit 
the principal towns where Christianity chiefly 
flourishes in the East, I should be happy, while 
I devoted myself to my scientific labours, to 
study the question of religion, to collect all the 
information that could throw light upon this 
delicate subject, and to render an account to his 
Holiness on the return of the expedition of 
which T had the honour of being a member. 
I asked, in closing the memorial, the apostolic 



PREPARATIONS FOR THE JOURNEY. 



17 



benediction upon my labours of the common 
Father of the Faithful, who has grace to guide 
the flock which Jesus Christ has confided to 
him, to the end that the kingdom of God may 
soon arrive upon earth, and that there may be 
only one great human family, one flock, and one 
shepherd. 

I am ignorant whether my humble address 
and my prayer of a child of the church ever 
reached Pius IX. Perhaps in the midst of the 
incessant agitations of these times, the memorial 
of an obscure pilgrim has remained in the port- 
folio of a secretary occupied with other mat- 
ters, who judged it better not to fatigue, with 
my supplication, the supreme Pontiff of the 
church. 

Perhaps these humble pages have passed 
under the observation of the vicar of Jesus 
Christ. His holy benediction, perhaps, followed 
me beyond the seas, and drew down upon me 
the almost miraculous protection of Providence, 
which never for one hour forsook me during 
the fatigues and dangers of my pilgrimage. 

All the preparations for our journey were 
completed. Besides M. Felicien de Saulcy, a 
young naturalist, who promises to be a Cuvier 
to science, and with whom I formed an intimate 
friendship during our travels, on account of his 
great modesty, so rare a virtue in young men of 

c 



18 



MY FELLOW-TRAVELLERS. 



our times, we were accompanied by Mr. E. 
Delessert, who had no idea how much this 
delightful tour would develope in him the ele- 
vated tastes of literature and science. 

We dispatched by the packet-boat a case of 
arms of all kinds, to await our arrival at Athens. 
Although we never had occasion to make use 
of them, we have congratulated ourselves upon 
this wise precaution, indispensable to Europeans 
whenever they make long excursions upon the 
roads traversed by caravans. Nothing is so 
imposing to men in the East as our pistols and 
double-barrelled guns. Fire-arms are, in their 
eyes, the infallible sign of power ; and the supe- 
riority of those which they see us use gives 
them the measure of our strength. Amongst 
these arms a handsome musket was allotted to 
me; but at our departure from Beyrout to 
Jerusalem my companions had pity upon a 
man who had never killed a sparrow in his life. 
The musket changed its owner, and was trans- 
ferred to the dragoman whom we had brought 
with us from Athens. I was left to my papers 
and to my plants. I found the advantage of 
this on every account ; the maxim, " Ecclesia 
abhorret a sanguine," suits my peaceful tastes 
wonderfully. 

It may seem singular that, having for our 
object to reach Greece and the East, we took the 



EUROPEAN REMINISCENCES. 



19 



direction of the north of Europe rather than that 
of Italy ; nevertheless, besides the pleasure of 
traversing that immense Germanic world, which 
extends from the Rhine to the frontiers of Poland, 
we had, thanks to steam, a great advantage in 
economy of time; and besides, we escaped the 
odious quarantines in the ports of the Mediter- 
ranean, and the annoyances of all sorts upon 
the roads through the small states of Italy. 
In a few days we found ourselves at Trieste, 
in the gulf of the Adriatic. We had travelled 
through Belgium, Rhenish Prussia, Hanover, 
Prussia, the south of ancient Poland, and Austria 
in its whole extent. We had seen Brussels, 
Cologne, Berlin, Breslau, Vienna, and Laybach. 
We travelled with the greatest rapidity over 
those vast plains which for twenty years had 
been the scene of the great battles of the Re- 
public and the Empire; we felt the same ground 
tremble beneath our carriages which had been 
accustomed to the noise of the French cannon, 
and at each station we trod the soil on which 
the French had slept after proclaiming victory. 

Such are the advantages of railroads. They 
cause ugly countries to disappear rapidly from 
the sight ; they economise for the traveller the 
precious moments devoted to visiting cities and 
monuments worthy of interest. He in this way 
escapes two deadly enemies, fatigue and mono- 

c 2 



20 



THE GERMANIC WORLD. 



tony. However little we may have the habit of 
observation, the numberless objects that pass 
before his eyes have no confusion in his mind. 
Those which make no impression vanish as soon 
as seen; whilst others, viewed with a ready and 
eager intelligence, impress the mind with recol- 
lections never to be effaced. The rapidity of 
movement accustoms the mind to form those 
vast combinations which embrace in one coup 
d'ccil results produced at considerable distances 
of time. The faculty of comparison, which has 
most easily brought objects together, most 
readily seizes upon their bearings. It is, with- 
out doubt, for every work of intelligence, a 
powerful means of research and of study. Men 
and countries are better teachers than books. 
When one has verified the errors without num- 
ber of the writings which have inspired the 
greatest confidence, we do not hesitate to pro- 
nounce that travelling can alone give exact 
notions upon every subject. 

I will only say one word of our journey across 
the north of Europe. Paris, and the departments 
which must be traversed as far as the frontiers of 
Belgium, are the limits of two worlds; nature, 
climate, race, manners, language, all change ra- 
pidly before you. The sky and the Germanic 
world present contrasts to France almost as 
decided as the sky and the world of the East. 



PERSISTENCY OF RACES. 



21 



These interminable plains which extend before 
your eyes; these rich pastures, these cultivated 
fields, which exhale their freshness, and the exu- 
berance of their vegetation ; this sky, less tinted 
with azure, and as monotonous as the earth 
itself, which seems levelled out before you ; this 
is what strikes you first. To this nature, which 
appears dumb, to this sky without transparency 
and without variety of horizon, add the calm 
and cold races, souls immoveable in their phlegm, 
all seeming to have sprung from one invariable 
type, which neither strike you by ugliness nor 
impress you by any prominent characteristic; 
add, again, a language which no longer owns 
parentage with the Greco-Roman languages of 
the south of Europe, and you will have some 
idea of the moral world of the north univer- 
sality. In the north the invariable character- 
istic is that it is commonplace; one feels that 
there is no initiative. In considering human 
societies as one single body, the Germanic races 
would appear like those thick muscles which 
are organic only that they may perform the least 
noble functions of life. 

But this world of ordinary intelligence and 
features, has a distinguished destiny in the future 
of civilization. Jt is conservative par excellence. 
Christianity has penetrated deeply into it. The 
Reformation has not attacked those admirable 



22 



ENTRY INTO PRUSSIA. 



convictions of evangelical faith which are the 
safeguard of the people of modern times. Pro- 
testantism, as a doctrine of negation, addressed 
itself to minds that did not comprehend the 
positivism of life. By a happy inconsequence, 
in separating themselves from Rome, they have 
preserved a great deal of what is practical in 
religion ; and while Calvinism in France reached 
the last limits of religious Radicalism, the masses 
in the North stopped upon the sliding declivity 
of Reform, and reconstructed upon the fragments 
of the church of the middle ages, a church of 
which reconciliation with Rome is now only an 
affair of prudence and of time. 

The Germanic races, incapable of playing the 
principal part in the world's progress, are called 
upon to second it powerfully. They are the 
corps de reserve upon which an army depends in 
a perilous enterprise. If they do not themselves 
gain the victory, they impede defeat. In this 
point of view, France, the initiative nation of 
the world, has her firmest support in Germany. 
In her bosom are sheltered, studied, and de- 
veloped the ideas that France in her fertility of 
invention has originated, and of which she will 
hasten to demand the speedy application in the 
world. 

These thoughts strongly impressed me as we 
advanced into the Prussian States. The evening 



BRUSSELS — ST V GUDULE. 



23 



before we had visited Brussels, where is revealed, 
at a first glance, that calm, measured mind, 
which is characteristic of Germany. Deprive 
this pretty little town of its cathedral and Hotel 
de Ville, beautiful works of another era, stand- 
ing there as witnesses of the past, and you will 
have left only an assemblage of squares, streets, 
and houses of the most uninteresting sameness, 
from which one feels impelled to escape else- 
where to seek some originality. 

I took some detailed notes upon Sainte 
Gudule, the cathedral of Brussels, and upon the 
H6fcel de Ville. I afterwards lost them. I do 
not regret them, as these buildings are so well 
known to all the world. I observed, however, a 
special type in the profile of the outline of the 
clock -tower of Sainte Gudule, which does not 
appear to me to have been studied, and which 
would constitute a remarkable difference between 
the Gothic buildings of Germany and those of 
our own country. It also appeared to me that 
the carved, pannelled pulpit of Sainte Gudule had 
been far too much praised. These carved pulpits 
of Belgium, where the capricious knife has, as 
it were, played amongst the leaves, in cuttings- 
out of every kind, may please the eyes at the 
first glance. It is for this reason they are so 
much esteemed in France, where they are spoken 
of as specimens of that which is most beautiful 



24 



PULPIT OF ST. GUDULE. 



in this style. They forgot one thing, and that 
is, that these pulpits are not at all favourable to 
the preacher ; he is lost in the midst of these 
carvings, and can scarcely be seen amongst the 
garlands ; attention is likely to wander upon 
the details of the sculptured frame-work that 
envelopes him on all sides. On the other hand, 
the carving itself is far from being perfect, I 
was much struck by the richness of the tombs 
which decorate the aisles of the church of Sainte 
Gudule. I brought away an extract from the 
beautiful epitaph of the Comte de Merode, who 
was struck by a bullet in fighting for the inde- 
pendence of Belgium, 



BERLIN. 



25 



CHAPTEK II. 

Berlin. — The Egyptian Museum. — The Anglican Movement, 
— Breslau. — Silesia. — Fortifications of Vienna. — Laybach. 
— Grlognitz. — Legitimacy and Religion. — The Count de 
Chambord. — Outskirts of Europe. — Illyria and Carniola. 
—First "View of the Mediterranean.— The G-ulf of Muia. 
— The old Roman Blood. — The Archduchess Sophia. — 
Arrival at Corfu. 

I pass over with regret the description of the 
pretty hills traversed by the railway between 
Brussels and Berlin, with its numerous little 
tunnels. 

Berlin strongly excited my curiosity. The 
city of the great Frederick must necessarily bear 
the impress of the eighteenth century, which 
laid out its streets in monotonous lines, and has 
constructed the palace of plaster. At the first 
glance, Berlin presents an appearance of gran- 
deur. Architecture has multiplied its colonnades 
and its pediments. When Frederick constructed 
for himself a Versailles at Potsdam, he must 
have dreamt that Berlin was the rival of Paris, 



26 



FREDERICK THE GREAT. 



Unfortunately, it is only a copy, which has all 
the defects of the model, without having its 
originality. The Grecian orders, transported to 
the north, are no longer in their place. Immense 
entablatures, corbels, capitals, bas-reliefs in the 
tympana, — all these beautiful conceptions of 
ancient art, display here nothing but feebleness. 
The frosts of the north cause the stone to 
exfoliate more rapidly than at Paris : during 
the long winters the marble assumes a blackish 
tint ; unpitying lichens and large mosses take 
root in the delicate carvings, covering ovolo 
and acanthus, and throwing over the statues 
and bas-reliefs a funereal garb, which is removed 
from time to time by scraping with a knife, or 
by ignoble colouring. The grand edifices of 
Berlin are only a work of imitation. There is 
not more genius in the constructions of the 
king-philosopher than in his petty verses. For 
the great comedy acted in the eighteenth cen- 
tury, nothing was required but plagiarists and 
decorators. 

What far surpass here the architecture of 
Frederick the Great, are the fine scientific col- 
lections of the museums. A decided taste for 
profound study places Germany at this day in 
a very elevated position. Science is the dis- 
tinctive genius of this people. M. de Saulcy 
was known to the most eminent men of Berlin, 
who were anxious to show him the most remark- 



THE EGYPTIAN MUSEUM. 



27 



able antiquities. The collection of coins at- 
tracted all the attention of the learned numis- 
matist. We had no less delight in visiting the 
new museum, of which the Egyptian section 
contains great treasures. Among the numerous 
columns which adorn the interior of this edifice, 
I recognised those which the mechanical marble 
works of the Pyrenees had recently forwarded 
from France. The great halls were covered with 
paintings in fresco. A very small number were 
open to the public. The Egyptian museum 
occupies a portion of the inferior hails. Great 
praise is due to the King of Prussia for the 
zeal with which he has enriched Berlin with 
the precious spoils of ancient Egypt. It is cer- 
tainly that which a stranger will most admire. 
But bad taste has spoilt this rich museum. 

An ill-advised antiquary has conceived the 
eccentric idea of having some Egyptian statues 
sculptured, of which there is nothing ancient 
but some very small fragments. These statues 
in stucco, which are beautifully executed, deceive 
the eye in the midst of real antiquities, by being 
mixed up with them. What is still worse, you 
find in the midst of frescoes representing hiero- 
glyphics, the royal eagle of Prussia. If you ask 
what this noble bird has to do with the ibis and 
the other symbols of the sacred language of 
Egypt, you learn that this legend in hierogly- 



28 



MODERN HIEROGLYPHICS. 



phics is the invention of the same antiquary, 
and that it records for the benefit of those who 
can read it, that the reigning prince has obtained, 
at great expense, the precious antiquities con- 
tained in this museum. It is a miserable abuse 
of genius that would make inscriptions in hiero- 
glyphics in the nineteenth century. 

I was to have had a conference at Berlin with 
one of the most learned men of the Lutheran 
church. He is a man of superior mind, with 
whom I might expect friendly relations upon 
the religious question. Unfortunately, he was 
unable to see me, having that very day to act in 
the office of president. I regretted it the more 
that a correspondence is so much less interesting 
and satisfactory between two men who have 
never met, and have not given themselves up 
to an unrestrained tete-d-tete, which reveals so 
powerfully one man to another. It is evident 
that Germany — the country of meditation and 
philosophy, which in the sixteenth century was 
the first to feel the necessity of reform — will not 
be the last to enter the broad road of unity, 
which is now the urgent need of Christian 
Europe. So long as the strength of the great 
evangelical family shall remain isolated ; so long 
as the unhappy separation which has afflicted all 
serious thinking men of divers Christian com- 
munions since the times of Bossuetand Molanus 



THE ANGLICAN MOVEMENT. 



29 



to our own, it is impossible that the faith of 
Christ should regain its empire over the civilized 
world. An impotent and lying deism will 
always fascinate rising generations, and will, by 
degrees, undermine ancient creeds. National 
pride will be flattered by an independence which 
is, in fact, nothing more than dissatisfied vanity. 
Narrow minds in the Catholic church will feel 
little anxiety for these obstinate heretics, without 
considering that the two great European nations, 
England and Germany, which together with 
France would uphold the sceptre of thought, 
paralyse, by their separation from Home, the 
powerful influence of Christian civilization. The 
religious world will follow its old paths : here, 
puerile rancours against Home ; there, fruitless 
attacks against Protestantism. We shall still 
be forced to veil our face and lament. 

We love to think better of those exalted 
minds which are the ornament of the several 
Christian communions, that they may at length 
free themselves from the prejudices of their 
national education. England offers, at this time, 
examples without number, of sincere returns to 
the Catholic faith. These instances, isolated as 
they are, in which at present the masses take no 
part, and which proceed generally from minds 
of the greatest intelligence, prove to the most 
prejudiced, with what facility the whole nation 



30 



OBSTACLES TO REUNION. 



would be moved, if it was first prepared for a 
solemn reconciliation by the agreement of the 
men who rule her spiritual destinies. 

There is no nobler work to which minds con- 
scious of great aspiration, can devote themselves, 
than that of this holy reconciliation. 

I wished, in this conference with the learned 
pastors, to make myself acquainted with the 
dispositions of the German populations ; with 
their state of religious belief, of the feeling of 
sympathy or of estrangement from the Romish 
church in their body of ministers ; of the in- 
fluence which they exercise upon the higher 
classes ; and of the part which they might be 
disposed to take in the project of reunion. I 
wished seriously to study the obstacles, to see 
that which political feeling, the eternal enemy of 
religious unity in Europe, would infallibly pro- 
duce ; those which private interests menaced by 
the reunion with Borne would also raise. I 
wished to ask whether the assembling of an 
oecumenical council, this general congress of the 
great Christian family, in which all communions 
would be represented, would come to pass with- 
out suspicion, would speak openly, would stipu- 
late for certain guarantees, and might expect 
from religious Germany a favourable reception. 
I should have proposed preliminary negotiations 
by the study of these great questions earned 



BRESLAU. FORESTS OF FIR. 



31 



on on both sides with a spirit of conciliation 
and of peace. There should be an understanding 
in Germany and in France to draw attention to 
these first studies, in which all should be avoided 
which might awaken the religious animosities of 
a time when they rose to the height of fana- 
ticism. The press, that great electric current 
which traverses the whole civilised world, would 
speak of this peaceful treaty between dissenting 
communions, and thus encourage a solemn 
reconciliation. 

Such was the plan which I had formed. I 
am happy to think that it may fall under the 
eye of enlightened men of noble minds, who 
have like them dreamed of this holy reconci- 
liation between religions apparently irreconci- 
lable. I shall hereafter relate that in one of 
the islands of the Archipelago, I met with a 
priest of the Greek Catholic church, who, upon 
his arid rock, had long with sadness asked him- 
self the question in his hours of silent medi- 
tation, when Catholic Europe would seriously 
apply itself to the work of the reunion of the 
oriental churches. 

We quitted Berlin on the 1st of October. 
The railway extends as far as Breslau, across 
plains without a limit, where forests of firs of 
perpetual fertility are the only objects that meet 
the eye upon the horizon. You no longer meet 



32 



SILESIA. — RUSSIAN POLAND. 



with the populous cities of Germany, her strong 
places, her numerous villages, her active agri- 
culture. You find yourself upon the frontiers 
of another world, amongst a people formerly 
great, but now isolated. It is impossible not 
to feel an involuntary pang at the thought of 
the rending asunder of nations, which had for 
their hearth-home one common country, noble 
institutions, wise kings, and illustrious men, a 
great history in the world. 

We made no stay at Breslau, the capital of 
Prussian Silesia, the fragment of Poland fallen 
to the lot of Prussia. The railway, in leaving 
Breslau, joins the Hmits of Russian Poland. 
We had the pleasure of hearing the French 
language spoken at this great distance from our 
country. We often found ourselves in the same 
carriage with men of the country of refined 
manners, and who spoke our language with faci- 
lity. We were in the France of the North, 
which still loves us, notwithstanding our barren 
sympathy, and our fruitless promises. 

I was struck with the form of the religious 
edifices of the North The kind of cupola used 
for belfries, is wanting in lightness and elegance. 
These cupolas, composed of divers curves more 
or less rounded, have none of the simplicity of 
the oriental cupola, which is always so regular 
and pure ; it appeared to me as if the churches 



WE APPROACH VIENNA. 



33 



were surmounted by large Chinese hats. They 
had neither the grandeur of our Eomanesque 
towers, nor the grandeur of our Gothic spires. 
We frequently saw these belfries in the Prus- 
sian and Austrian provinces bordering upon 
Eussia. In approaching Vienna, they disap- 
pear gradually. The vicinity of Italy begins to 
make itself felt. Other manners, another life, 
another architecture. 

Vienna resembles Berlin in nothing. There 
are in reality two political centres of Germany, 
without speaking yet of Frankfort and of the 
cities of the Ehine. One single idea is domi- 
nant in the Prussian city. The recent creation 
of the empire of which it is the capital, is 
reflected in everything. One sees a people 
which has become great, and which will become 
still greater. Its instinct of preponderance be- 
trays itself at each moment. This city, where 
upon nine passengers out of ten you see a 
helmet and a sword, these fortified places main- 
tained as in time of war, these civil and military 
constructions in which the architect has pleased 
himself with restoring throughout gates in 
ogee, machicolations, the battlements of feudal 
times, — indicate without mistake, the sentiments 
of material strength which aspires to conquest 
and aggrandizement. 

At Vienna there is nothing of all this. There 

P 



34 



FORTIFICATIONS OF VIENNA. 



is here none of the unity in a people conscious 
of a future. It is a government which would 
not willingly fall ; nothing more, Vienna alone 
is the strange symbol of Austrian monarchy, 
formed of so many parts. The old city is in the 
centre, surrounded on all sides with immense 
and heavy fortifications. The modern town ex- 
tends in breadth beyond the glacis of the imperial 
city. In both one and the other you are sen- 
sible of the grandeur, and of the capital of an 
empire. But these high walls, with their con- 
tinuous battlements paced by sentinels ; these 
multiplied posts occupied by guards, their sombre 
posterns beneath which you pass with bent head, 
all inspire you with a feeling of awe. One is 
inclined to ask oneself whether Vienna is in a 
state of siege ; or rather, whether the city of the 
Emperor is in fear of the immense town which 
surrounds it on all sides. 

Vienna is the only city of the civilized world 
which presents this aspect. A foreigner cannot 
understand it, but he suffers from it. He feels 
an involuntary preoccupation and oppression in 
the midst of the crowd passing and repassing 
in silence around him. In the twinkhng of an 
eye, the cry, to arms ! might resound, the heavy 
gates of this warlike city close, the chains of 
iron extend, the wooden bridges break up upon 
the rivers, and the cannon make itself heard in 



LAYBACH. — GLOGNITZ. 



35 



loud and terrible reverberations. The Austrian 
monarchy is on the watch. The terrible revo- 
lution through which it has lately passed, and 
over which it has only triumphed by unheard-of 
good fortune, is the fatal indication of a dis- 
organization which it is impossible not to fore- 
see, and of which the end, more or less distant, 
alarms it : — one, it may be said, that is the 
least stable empire of Europe, — a power, there- 
fore, upon the ocean of revolution, which resem- 
bles a boat painfully endeavouring to avoid a 
rock. 

I have said nothing of the minute precautions 
of the police against foreigners. One is accus- 
tomed to these civilities out of France, but one 
cannot enter Vienna without leaving one's pass- 
port at the barrier, which is only returned to you 
at the Bureau General. We stayed at Vienna 
at a magnificent hotel, which yields in nothing 
to the most sumptuous in Paris, or in London. 
The people of the hotel spoke tolerable French. 
We left Vienna at night for Laybach. The 
first-class carriages formed long saloons fur- 
nished with transverse benches, capable of 
accommodating a large number of travellers. 
One might walk up and down them if so inclined. 
After Grlognitz, they assumed another form. 
A little closet opened in the hinder part which 
could contain four persons. It was in one of 

D 2 



36 



LEGITIMACY AND RELIGION. 



these carriages, at a little distance from Frohsdorf, 
that I met a Frenchman, Colonel Horric, who 
had been to pay his court to the Comte de 
Chambord. He was accompanied by the secre- 
tary of the Prince, and was, like him, bound for 
Trieste. While passing along that part of the car- 
riage occupied by us, on his way to the smaller 
carriage, we recognised each other; an excla- 
mation of joy escaped from our hearts ; we were 
in an instant in each other's arms, astonished to 
meet again at so great a distance from our 
country, and we mutually related the objects of 
our journey. I had not seen the gallant colonel 
since the revolution of February. 

The conversation naturally fell upon the rapid 
stride of events, in which we had taken part, in 
France. 

# * * # 
And here we again met, — he a pilgrim of 

legitimacy, going to rekindle his loyalty in the 
presence of the heir of that dynasty which 
reigned over old France; I a pilgrim of the 
faith, about to carry my priest's heart to the 
tomb of Jesus Christ, and to celebrate the in- 
effable mystery upon the rock itself, where was 
accomplished that sacrifice, at the price of which 
the world has been redeemed. 

* * * * 
The secretary of the Comte de Chambord, a 



THE COUNT DE CHAMBORD. 37 

man of easy manners, with the refined air of a 
courtier, and the polished and guarded language 
of a diplomatist, was not a little surprised at our 
communications. He wished to know what was 
thought of the future of royalty by a man 
whose honest frankness recalled to him no 
doubt the peasant of the Danube. He drily 
proposed questions, and discussed them with 
admirable tact ; and gave me, during an inter- 
view which lasted more than four hours, a rare 
example of that exquisite temper, of that polish 
of good society with which men not enlisted 
under the same banner ought to support their 
convictions, always honourable when they pro- 
ceed from conscience, and that have not been 
inspired by the odious calculations of interest. 
I made notes of this conversation, which had 
great charms for me : it is a little page of con- 
temporaneous history, which would naturally 
have found a place in a traveller's journal, if 
reasons of importance did not oblige me to 
withhold them from publicity. 

It was a singular destiny that placed me 
upon a railway in the centre of Austria, tra- 
versing the high mountains of the Tyrol, the 
tortuous banks of the Murre, and discussing 
with a faithful follower of the ancient monarchy, 
the chances of a restoration, at two paces from 
Gr'atz and Frohsdorf ! Had I been alone, like 



38 



ALARMING INCIDENT. 



the gallant Colonel, I should have paid my 
respects in his exile to the Prince to whom I 
had done homage when, as a child, he was 
leaving the Tuileries with his sister to go to 
Bagatelle. Political hatreds cannot reach my 
heart : it is a sufficient evil for France to be 
divided into two irreconcilable camps. It is 
sad that petty rancours and passions unworthy 
of exalted minds should be added, which ought 
before all things to think of their country's 
welfare. 

During our long interview, the Colonel had 
from time to time let fall some noble senti- 
ments. Notwithstanding, for about an hour, I 
had observed that his countenance had changed, 
and expressed suffering. In fact, he owned 
that he was suffering intense pain. The pain 
soon increased to such intensity, that he could 
only say, " Let me out ! let me out !" It was 
however necessary to wait for the next railway 
station. 

We sent for the master of an inn, and 
recommended our unfortunate fellow-country- 
man to his care. It was agreed that if he 
could be a little relieved, he should resume the 
route to Trieste, and rejoin us the next day. I 
could not have parted from a brother with a 
deeper feeling of regret than that which I felt 
in parting from my excellent friend, without 



OUTSKIRTS OF EUROPE. 



39 



however thinking that my last embrace was a 
final adieu. 

During the four days passed by us at Trieste, 
I tried in vain to obtain tidings of our sick 
friend left behind : it was impossible to obtain 
any. We set out for Greece ; and later, at 
Beyrout, a letter from France informed me 
of the death of one of those men, so rarely 
met with, who can sacrifice their interests 
and future prospects in life to their convic- 
tions. 

Colonel Horric belonged to one of the old 
families of Angoumois. At the fall of the elder 
branch of the Bourbons he had quitted the army, 
notwithstanding the positive assurance of rapid 
advancement. He lived peaceably for some 
years in retirement and in the bosom of religion 
and of friendship. I shall be pardoned for 
dwelling upon these sorrowful recollections, for 
the sake of a man who was on his melancholy 
way to end his days in a foreign land, whilst 
I, a happy pilgrim, though exposed to more 
dangers and fatigues, might hope to rejoin again 
those who were dear to me in the bosom of my 
country. 

The railway terminates at Laybach. We 
may say that we were bidding adieu to Euro- 
pean civilization. A new world was about to 
reveal itself to my sight, from the summit of 



40 



ILLYRJA AND CARNIOLA. 



the large and elevated plateau that nature has 
thrown, like the edge of a vase, around the 
beautiful lake called the Mediterranean. 

The transition had been sudden, from aristo- 
cratic carriages in which we could stretch our- 
selves luxuriously, to wretched Italian cars, 
which took possession of us and our luggage, to 
convey us to Trieste. After we had climbed, at 
the slowest pace of the horses which drew our 
dilapidated vehicles, the northern declivity of 
the Illyrian mountains, nature presented herself 
to us in an entirely different aspect ; it was no 
longer the smiling mountains of Styria and 
Carniola ; adieu for ever to the shady vallies, 
the enamelled meadows, the dense forests, the 
groves overhanging the cultivated hills. You 
now see for the first time such a soil as 
your eye will find all over Greece, in Asia, and 
almost as far as the Indian islands. A barren 
soil, nearly red in colour from the scorching 
sun ; a vegetation burnt up by summer heat ; 
another zone, another climate. 

We were many long hours crossing this 
plateau, a species of desert between two worlds, 
between two civilizations ; but suddenly the 
horizon sank down before us : — a gorge, the 
immensity of w T hich the eye had difficulty in 
measuring, formed an illimitable arch, of which 
we occupied the centre. Trieste, luxuriously 



FIRST VIEW OF THE MEDITERRANEAN. 41 

bathed in the waters, lay before us. On the 
right we might fancy we saw sumptuous but 
impoverished Venice ; on the left, the little 
gulf of Muia, behind which extended inter- 
minably the mountains of ancient Epirus, at 
this day an obscure province of the Turkish 
empire. 

The view was magnificent. Besides which, 
I then saw the Mediterranean for the first time. 
And did not that mysterious sea hide from my 
sight the world towards which my aspirations 
had so often transported me ? And would not 
one of those vessels so peacefully at anchor in 
the port, convey me in a few days to Greece — 
to the East? At such moments, that which 
we actually see is embellished by what is still 
unseen. Trieste was literally to me the vestibule 
of an enchanted palace. 

It is certain that, although my impressions 
may be deprived of all poetry, now that views 
of another kind of grandeur have made me 
forget a thousand times this first aspect of a 
nature quite new to me, the view of this gulf 
has, notwithstanding, a peculiar charm in my 
memory. 

Here, for the first time, I felt a taste for that 
marvellous nature of the East, which has so in- 
flamed my heart ; a first revelation to my sight 
of those intense colourings which I only knew 



42 



ACCESSION TO OUR PARTY. 



froni books, and which I had often set down for 
the vain exaggerations of a traveller's pen. 

Before arriving at Trieste, the road makes a 
considerable detour, for the sake of reaching an 
easier descent. We soon entered the town ; 
and after passing along broad, straight streets, 
paved after the ancient fashion, we took up our 
quarters in a splendid hotel immediately oppo- 
site to the port, within a few feet of the Austrian 
vessel which was to convey us to Athens. 

We found, awaiting our arrival at Trieste, 
two travelling- companions, MM. Loysel and 
Belly. These two agreeable tourists were men 
of the most delightful manners. They never 
ceased, during the whole journey, to show me 
most considerate attention. This friendship, 
formed during a life in which we had mingled 
our thoughts and our impressions of all kinds, 
remains uninterrupted, now that we have each 
re-entered the ordinary course of our affairs and 
our labours. Our hands, when we meet, ex- 
change a warmer pressure ; we recollect the 
valley of Nablous and the plain of Jordan. 

We were not to leave Trieste for four days. 
The morning after our arrival, October 6th, was 
devoted to a delightful sail on the Mediter- 
ranean. 

The weather was splendid — it was the middle 
of autumn in this delicious climate. We took a 



AFLOAT FOR THE FIRST TIME. 



43 



boat, and directed our course to the Gulf of 
Muia : it was the first time that I had been 
upon the sea. The least movement of our frail 
bark, the least variation of the wind in our 
latteen sail, which the boatmen managed with 
wonderful address, excited in me those first fears 
which I sought in to vain conceal, and which were 
the cause of laughter to my joyous companions. 
I had always dreaded the sea ; and nevertheless, 
few days had passed during our voyage, before 
I was captivated with the boisterous element, as 
one loves all that is sublime ; rivers, glaciers, 
forests, and the heights of mountains. When 
the tempest roared, when the storm, disdaining 
the impotence of the waves, cut them by an 
irresistible bound, I leant over the prow of the 
vessel, rocking myself with it as it seemed to 
sink down and be engulphed, to reascend with 
it upon the trembling wave ; I braved the 
furious element, and mingled my daring with 
that of the majestic vessel which seemed to 
laugh to scorn the waters and their fury. 

Muia is little spoken of, only because all that 
is beautiful is not spoken of. Ordinarily we 
admire only that which others have admired 
before us; happily my companions and I had 
not this respect for the traveller's weakness. 
M. de Saulcy and I had agreed never to give 
way to this foible ; uncompromising in our frank- 



44 



BOTANICAL EXCURSION. 



ness, we would not swear by the authority of 
any one. We were going to verify what had 
been written before us • they were not decisions 
that we intended to submit to the opinion of 
any one. This mutual determination to travel 
with perfect freedom in our appreciations, may 
perhaps give some charm to my details upon 
countries the descriptions of which have been so 
tediously repeated. 

Our embarkation left us upon the opposite 
coast to that of Trieste, at the foot of a species 
of promontory which closes, towards the south, 
the entrance of the Gulf of Muia. The boatmen 
received orders to await our arrival at Muia 
itself, which place we intended to leave after a 
long entomological and botanical excursion along 
the coast. 

Our search after plants and insects was as 
successful as we had hoped. I there saw for 
the first time the plants of the Mediterranean 
basin, which I should find again upon all the 
shores of Greece, and even at the foot of the 
Acropolis. I then recommenced those studies 
of the vegetable kingdom to which I had 
devoted such delightful days in the society of 
M. Philippe and my friends of the Pyrenees. 
And what a flora, and in what regions ! From 
the smiling Corfu, the naked rocks of Syra, the 
foot of Pentelicus, the heights of Taygetus, the 



THE GULF OF MUIA. 



45 



plains of Sparta, Ithome, the marshes of Lerna, 
the vines of Eleusis, in fact all Greece as far as 
the necropolis of the Phenician cities ; to the 
sands of Beyrout, to the mighty ridges of the 
two Lebanons, to the plains of Tyre and of 
Acre, to Carmel, to the borders of the Lake of 
Tiberias, of the Dead Sea, of Jordan, in the 
Valley of Jehoshaphat, and on those silent 
heights from the centre of which rises Jerusalem 
in her majesty : what a nature and what names ! 

The flowers of the Gulf of Muia still live in 
my memory, and I should have little difficulty, 
were it possible, to traverse the intervening 
space with the rapidity of thought, to point out 
the exact spot from which I gathered each. 
Nothing more vividly reminds the traveller, 
when he wishes to recall in detail the places he 
has visited, than the sight of the plants dis- 
covered there ; the ground which has furnished 
them remains imprinted on his memory in 
ineffaceable characters. Oh ! of what a charm 
the traveller is deprived, who neglects this study ; 
which is at the same time the least fatiguing, 
the most easy, and the most fruitful in pleasure. 

We at last reached Muia. This is a very 
small Venetian town, which does not exceed the 
extent of the Tuileries and the Louvre, delight- 
fully situated at the extremity of the gulf, and 
crowned with vineyard-plots planted in terraces, 



46 



THE OLD ROMAN BLOOD. 



one rising above another upon the declivity of 
immense hills, of which they occupy the foot. 
Some remarkable fragments of the old enclosure 
of the middle ages, still show the battlements, 
and here and there enormous breaches which 
modern times will never repair. This city, 
now so obscure, a little habitation for boatmen, 
whose ancestors were powerful and rich at the 
time of the prosperity of Venice its metropolis, 
is one of the remains of the past which attract 
the traveller as one is attracted to all ruins. 

I sketched its palace, a wonderful little edifice 
in the Venetian style, where the magistrates of 
the city held their government. The Lion of 
Venice is sculptured upon it, surrounded by the 
escutcheons of the principal families of Muia. 
Latin inscriptions recall these bright memories ; 
but the mariners of Muia no longer understand 
these Latin legends, and the Hon will awake no 
more. 

The Koman blood, however, is preserved in 
all its purity. The men are remarkable for 
their beauty, and the women especially have a 
nobleness of feature and a regularity of outline, 
which recall the sculptures of antiquity. 

I visited with the greatest care the church of 
Muia ; it forms, as well as the palace, one of 
the sides of the public square ; the other sides 
are occupied by houses and balconies of elegant 



THE ARCHDUCHESS SOPHIA, 47 

and original architecture. One saw Venice in 
miniature. 

We returned to Trieste. They were prepar- 
ing for grand rejoicings on the morrow ; as a 
solemn reception of the Archduchess Sophia, 
mother of the young Emperor of Austria, was 
to take place. She was to alight at our hotel. 
We had come to seek other objects than such 
fetes — an eternal repetition of the same curiosity, 
and of the same lies ; besides, we were going to 
San Bartolommeo, on the western side of Trieste, 
to continue, as on the previous day, our re- 
searches and investigations as naturalists. 

This was a less successful search than that at 
Muia ■ a small but penetrating rain compelled 
us to seek shelter in a country-house, which we 
reached by a long tunnel, covered with the 
most beautiful grapes. We had now to bid 
adieu to insects and to plants, and to regain our 
boat ; the wind was contrary, and I was as 
frightened as a child ; we tacked about for a 
long time, in order that we might gain the open 
sea, and meet with a good wind to carry us into 
port. 

We had, in the evening, beneath our windows, 
the band of a regiment which serenaded the 
Archduchess. This German music was most 
beautiful. 

It was Monday, October 7th. The next day 



48 ANOTHER EXCURSION. 

is 

we returned to Mu'ia ; the clay was delicious. 
I took more sketches of buildings, particularly 
that of the facade of the church ; I finished my 
notes upon these buildings, and copied the 
inscriptions upon the palace. My travelling 
album, which contained these little works, pre- 
cious to me, were stolen from me at the Piraeus, 
at the very moment we were embarking for 
Constantinople. 

We were to leave Trieste on Thursday, the 
10th of October. We had only one day left ; I 
devoted it again to Muia. I am tenacious in 
my admirations, and faithful in my friendships. 
This time I returned there alone, but, fearful of 
the sea, I made an immense detour on foot, fol- 
lowing the line of coast, and skirting the gulf. 
I was indemnified by a most enjoyable bota- 
nizing of marine plants. On my return to 
Muia, after having traversed the lowland, where 
there are salt-pans, I regained the road which 
brought me to Trieste. Before reaching the 
town, I saw several cemeteries. Every religious 
body at Trieste has its own cemetery. I had a 
horrible presentiment and feeling of despon- 
dency in passing by these fields of death. Some 
days after our departure, the good colonel, whom 
I had left at Stembriick, arrived at Trieste ; his 
illness grew worse, and the cemetery of the 
Catholics opened to receive the remains of a 



ARRIVAL AT CORFU. 



49 



man whose greatness of soul and nobleness of 
character I had so much loved. 

On the 10th, at three o'clock, we had bid 
farewell to Trieste ; we were on board the 
Austrian steamer, the "Vor warts," Captain 
Verona. 

We were not more than a few leagues from 
the gulf, when the sea became rough. It con- 
tinued so the whole of the next day. The 
night of the 1 2th was awful ; we were struck 
by some very high seas. At length, on the 
13th, towards one o'clock in the morning, we 
were at Corfu. 



E 



50 



CHATEAUBRIAND, 



CHAPTER III. 

Corfu: its Eamparts. — The Governor's Palace. — A Night 
on Deck. — Occupations on Board. — Botanical Pleasures. 
— Island of Sapienza. — Syra, — Our Dragoman. — The 
Archipelago. — Historical Associations. — Pirst View of 
Athens. — -A Greek Khan. — Temple of Theseus. — Hotel 
d' Orient. — The Propylaea. — The Parthenon. 

On setting out for Greece and Jerusalem, 
Chateaubriand had embarked, like ourselves, at 
Trieste, on board a little Austrian vessel : he 
experienced a similar tempest. Sailing on the 
1st of August, it was not until the 6th that he 
found himself at Corfu, where he never landed. 
The author of the " Itinerary " compensates his 
reader, by giving him the benefit of the history 
and fabulous legends of Corfu. Nothing is 
more easy than the display of this petty erudi- 
tion. It was the mania of this illustrious 
author. He was a painter ; he had an admi- 
rable palette ; but this was not sufficient glory 
for him. He wished also to gain the reputa- 
tion of a scholar. "W e owe him very little 
thanks for the labour which he has imposed 



CORFU- — ITS RAMPARTS. 



51 



upon himself in grouping around the name of 
each ancient town the principal events which 
have given it celebrity. Every pen could 
write these things ; but where he is a great 
master, is in his descriptions of nature, in those 
touches of sentiment which spring from a great 
soul, in those strokes of the pencil which elevate 
the thoughts, and give them tone. These are 
real beauties. 

We passed a delightful day at Corfu. The 
citadel where the English hold their garrison is 
an immense rock, admirably fortified both by 
nature and art. The ancient works were exe- 
cuted by the Venetians. The lion of St. Mark 
is sculptured upon the gates, and seems to bow 
its head like one vanquished, to recall the humi- 
liation of its country. 

It was Sunday, the 13th of October; the 
population crowded the streets ; there was some- 
thing in the movement, the discordant cries so 
violent and so rude, which involuntarily made a 
painful impression upon me. I felt ill at ease in 
that crowd, and the people seemed by their looks 
to regard us as enemies. 

Notwithstanding my sympathy for the Hel- 
lenic nation, my first impression was not favour- 
able to the Greeks at Corfu. 

I thought their countenances bad and false. 
It is true, that I had before me that unpolished 

E 2 



52 



THE GOVERNOR'S PALACE. 



plebeian race always employed in the hardest 
labours of the ports, which in every country- 
represents the least noble aspect of a people. 

From all the upper parts of the town, you 
have an enchanting coup-d'ceil. "We were shown 
in a great square the Governor's palace, a rather 
pretty building, in an enchanting situation. 
The English show their taste in offering their 
protection to people who give up to their service 
spacious harbours, grand citadels, and countries 
so delightful to inhabit. I would that some 
fine morning France might find herself in the 
exercise of a protection of this nature, in Syria, 
Lebanon, and Palestine. And why not ? The 
flag of France, after the emancipation of the 
populations of Lebanon and Palestine, would 
float over Beyrout, Sidon, Tyre, St. Jean d'Acre, 
Jaffa 5 Tiberias, and Jerusalem. These rich 
countries, protected by a strong and intelligent 
nation, would become great under our tutelage. 
The Arab race would come to the sun of our 
civilization, to demand a knowledge of letters, 
and of those arts for which they have more 
aptitude and taste than is generally thought. 

Caesarea and Ascalon would rise from their 
ruins. Under the protection of our banner, 
agricultural colonies would establish themselves 
on this side of Syria, where ancient cities stood 
at many hours' distance from the road. 



NEW PLANTS. 



53 



But let us leave this subject, to return to it 
later. 

We went to visit the island. A high road 
enabled us to go in a carriage as far as an emi- 
nence called the Canona, one of the most en- 
chanting spots in Corfu. At our feet was a 
delicious bay, where the sea, calm as a little 
lake, washed the shores covered with a smiling 
vegetation. The olive tree is here in its native 
country. It is almost as fine as in Palestine. 
On Canona we had a successful hunt after plants 
and insects. I found the Ophrys spiralis ; and 
the Orniihogalum Squilla, in flower, bending its 
long thyrsi towards a burning sun ; and a great 
number of other delicate flowers of Greece, which 
I here saw for the first time. 

The fertility of Corfu is wonderful. It is a 
privileged land, which I found at the entrance 
of Greece to give me a first idea of this beauti- 
ful nature. At Corfu I had an idea of the 
East. 

The same day, at a quarter to three, we set 
sail. The sea was calm, the night beautiful. 
The temperature was so mild that I yielded to 
the temptation of passing the night upon the 
deck. I had the hair quilt brought up from my 
cabin, and then, enveloped in my cloak, before 
resigning myself to sleep, I enjoyed some long 
hours in the contemplation of the azure sky, and 



54 



A NIGHT ON DECK. 



of the twinkling stars reflected on the surface of 
the waters. There is an animation in a voyage 
by steam, which sailing only has in times of 
storm. You feel the vessel as a living body 
beneath you ; its trembling motion at every 
blow that it receives from the steam, the noise 
of its rapid wheels, which seem to seize the 
liquid element as the wings of a bird strike 
the air, the two foaming cascades spouting from 
its sides, often besprinkled with phosphorescent 
sparks — all this gives an especial individuality 
to a steam-vessel. It is a creation which seems 
to have its own energy and vitality. It is not 
quite an animal with its organization and spon- 
taneous motion ; it is not the monstrous whale 
presenting its broad ridge upon the surface of 
the water ; but it is something more than 
the sailing-vessel, which excites no observation. 
Steam obeys you ; it carries organs within its 
sides which retard or hasten its course at the 
least word, without waiting for a breath of air 
to move it. 

You should see it in a storm. It scolds, 
screams, and murmurs amid the waters which 
murmur and scold around it. You would say 
that it is irritated by the violence of the blows 
it receives, and that it redoubles its efforts to 
conquer the furious element. Sometimes, when 
the billows sink, to rise again furious, and 



OCCUPATIONS ON BOARD. 



55 



threaten to engulf it, it suddenly makes a bound, 
and by a prodigious effort of strength, clears 
the wave and cuts through it. You tremble 
with it when it descends with horrible moan- 
ings upon the unequal surface, where it finds 
resistance, as a wrestler from whose swelling 
breast escapes a deep groan when he falls upon 
the foe he has prostrated. 

In calm weather the steamer advances without 
effort, and in its steady march leaves behind 
two immense tracks traced by its wheels, in 
which the waters seem with difficulty to recover 
their former immobility. How often, when all 
was hushed around me, when my eye could only 
descry on the monotonous shore the doubtful 
line which separates the blue sea from a sky 
paled by vapour, I have placed myself at the 
extremity of the vessel, letting my thoughts 
wander with my eyes upon the immensity which 
was unrolled without and before us. Life, on a 
beautiful sea, in a delicious climate like that of 
the Archipelago, is intoxicating. You feel 
exalted and made great by all the power 
and genius of man, which has vanquished 
the most terrible of the elements. As for me, 
I had at this moment all that could embellish 
a voyage. Sometimes my plants from Corfu 
required change of paper ; when the sun was 
brilliant I could spread my papers upon deck ; 



56 



BOTANICAL PLEASURES. 



in dull weather I had recourse to the top of 
the boiler, where I dried them as in a stove. 
Happy hours those which are devoted to botan- 
ical pursuits ! The passengers often gathered 
around nie to examine my precious plants, and 
to inquire their names. I had a peculiar plea- 
sure in saying that these plants were as unknown 
to me as to themselves. This ignorance of 
foreign plants, during my botanical expeditions, 
was the charm of every hour. If I had had 
the misfortune to be learned, all would have 
been disenchanted ; to dry a plant that one has 
seen a hundred times in a herbarium, that one 
has already studied and possessed, how common- 
place this is ! But to stop at each new flower, 
and to say, "I do not know you/' and to ask 
yourself of what family it is, to what genus 
this unknown beauty belongs ; to try to resolve 
this problem whilst you have the enjoyment of 
contemplating it, to remark its peculiarities, to 
mark its characteristics, to note its position 
when alive before flattening it mercilessly be- 
tween leaves of paper ; to fix in one's memory 
the exact spot which gave it birth, the manner 
of its growth, its peculiar stations, and the 
orientalisms it affords ; to compose a history of 
this little creation of God, in which his almighty 
power seems exhausted in the richness of its 
form and colour ; and to carry away with one, 



ARCADIA . 



57 



as priceless friends, these treasures of nature, for 
the sake of enjoying till the last days of exist- 
ence the pleasure of travelling over again, and 
seeing again the spots and the regions where 
they were gathered — these are the pure pleasures 
belonging to the life of a botanist. 

At other times, on board ship, the hours flew 
in long conversations with M. de Saulcy and 
other friends. The society of learned men is 
an inappreciable advantage in travelling. These 
men are living libraries, whence you may draw 
without effort a thousand facts, and a thousand 
recollections. During eight long months, I have 
often put to the proof, by my perpetual questions, 
the kind friend to whom I was indebted for my 
delightful tour to the East. I never tired his 
patience. 

I forgot to say that we had made great 
friends with our gallant Captain Verona. I 
now see the little man with his calm open coun- 
tenance, concealing, nevertheless, under his good 
nature a great deal of firmness. We had great 
cause for congratulation in all our dealings with 
him. He was to leave us at Syra, where 
another vessel would take us up, and convey us 
to Athens. f 

On the 14th, at 8 a.m. we were opposite to 
the coast of Arcadia. We then saw Messenia, 
Laconia, Navarino, Modon, the gulf of Coron, 



58 



ISLAND OF SAPIENZA. 



and the island of Sapienza. We saw Taygetus 
entirely free from snow. 

Amongst the passengers of distinction on 
board the H Yorwarts," bound for the East, T 
must not forget Mr. "Wood, the English Consul 
at Damascus, with whom we became very inti - 
mate, and whom we again saw at Damascus, 
where he received us with the greatest kindness. 
Mr. Wood had recently married in England, 
and he was taking his young bride to the East : 
my companions derived great pleasure from their 
society. 

I often conversed with Mr, Yv^ood, who gave 
me a number of useful hints for my researches. 
He is thoroughly acquainted with the East, 
which he has inhabited for a great number of 
years, and in the late affairs there he played an 
important part to support the political interests 
of his country. The details which he gave us 
upon various episodes of the war in which he 
took part, were most interesting. 

In passing before Sapienza, we took aside the 
English Consul, and asked him what could be 
the use of this miserable rock, that its possession 
had been an object of such ardent desire on the 
part of England % 

"This rock," he told us, "is in itself worth 
little, it is true ; but look at that cove; it might 
become a magnificent harbour, and prove a 



ENGLAND IN THE MEDITERRANEAN. 59 

shelter for a fleet. Sapienza would be a key of 
Greece, the bond as it were of a great mari- 
time power. This, gentlemen, is the use of 
Sapienza." 

England has, in fact, marked out her route 
in the Mediterranean, by Gibraltar, Malta, and 
Corfu. Sapienza, or any other rock in the 
Archipelago, with a good harbour, is still 
wanting. It is not a large tract of country 
which she wants solely for her anchorage, but a 
station that would bring her nearer to Athens, 
to Constantinople, and to Smyrna, to all those 
points where her commercial relations require a 
vigilant protection. 

A good harbour and a citadel at Sapienza 
would be worth the whole of the Peloponnesus 
to England. A few guns and a few soldiers 
would suffice to guard this rock, from whence 
England could overlook the Dardanelles, and if 
needful, command the whole of the Archi- 
pelago. 

I made sketches of Modon, Coron, Navarino, 
the island of Venetico, and the island of Sa- 
pienza. The next day I took one of Seripho. 
These hasty pencil strokes, thrown as it were 
upon the leaves of an album, recall pleasantly 
in after-times, the fugitive forms which the 
memory has failed to retain. One day, I shall 



60 



SYR A. 



perhaps iook upon them with pride, and as a last 
amusement of old age. 

We reached Syra on the 17th, at ten o'clock 
a.m. The island of Syra, formed, like all the 
islands of the Archipelago, of a group of moun- 
tains, offers a denuded aspect, that is distressing 
to one's sight. These islands, without vege- 
tation, appear as if a great fire had passed over 
them, and form a painful contrast to the beau- 
tiful sky above. When one reflects that this 
enchanting nature has been deprived of her 
most beautiful dress by long centuries of slavery, 
one feels compassion for the soil, which lacked 
nothing in the time of her glory, not even mis- 
fortune. One treads this soil with reverence, as 
one would with emotion press the hand of an 
old friend, after he had been tried by long 
afflictions. 

We were obliged to return to dine on board. 
We had only a few hours left, so I put off my 
visit to the Bishop of Syra until my return. 
I regretted, afterwards, not having devoted the 
time left to my disposal to an interview with 
this amiable prelate, to whom I was indebted 
for the intimate acquaintance of the learned 
Abbe Marinelli. What valuable hints, what 
objects for study might have been furnished me 
for my religious excursion in Greece ! and the 



OUR DRAGOMAN. 



61 



more easily, as M. Bari, a merchant of Smyrna, 
who had accompanied us from Trieste, most 
kindly offered to present me to the bishop, to 
whom he is related. 

As I am bound to inform the reader of all 
my impressions, I must also confess all my 
weaknesses. I hesitated between this visit, of 
which I did not then know the importance, and 
the pleasure which I had promised myself in a 
botanical expedition. We were in the middle 
of autumn, and I thought the island must still 
abound in flowers, and I had gathered such 
beautiful ones at Corfu ! MM. de Saulcy, Feli- 
cien, and Edward, had gone in search of insects ; 
should I follow their example ? one does not 
botanize every day in the islands of the Archi- 
pelago. The flowers carried the day, and I 
followed my friends upon the mountain which 
commands Syra on the east. 

Whilst my companions, halting at every 
stone, slowly climbed the foot of the mountain, 
conducted by a dragoman who joined us on 
board, addressing me as " Monseigneur," and 
M. de Saulcy as " Monsieur le Vicomte," I had 
gained ground, and reached the heights, where 
I hoped to find a rich spoil. I was really for - 
tunate. All this vegetation was entirely new 
to me ; and with the exception of some vines 
and fig-trees, nothing recalled the flora of 



62 



THE ARCHIPELAGO. 



"France, and above all, that of our mountains. 
I found the carnation in flower, which I did not 
expect to gather until the month of February, at 
Jerusalem. The foliage of this tree is beautiful, 
both as to form and colour. With the syca- 
more, which in the East attains a considerable 
height, it is one of the trees of which the foliage 
is most pleasing to the eye. I do not speak of 
the palm, as no tree can be compared to it in 
grace and majesty. 

Before leaving the heights where I stood, I 
anticipated the view which lay at my feet. I 
was actually in one of those islands of the Archi- 
pelago, of which the poetic names had so often 
delighted me : Paros, Milo, Ceos, Teos, Hydra, 
Andros. I trod the sacred soil of Greece ; and 
this harbour which I saw full of vessels, this 
town which had doubled in extent, and whose 
inhabitants no longer, in fear, seek for shelter as 
formerly in their acropolis, but repose at liberty 
in the country, after twelve years of heroic 
struggle : — all this was before me. 

Since the war of independence, Syra has 
made considerable advance; her port is safe and 
sheltered. Felicien and I followed the line of 
the immense area which forms the bay ; we saw 
numerous docks, in which merchant ships were 
building : the new town, which extends all 
round the harbour, is already important. Great 



HISTORICAL ASSOCIATIONS. 



63 



animation reigns in it. The Greeks have not 
changed ; they are still the talking, arrogant, 
active people, which antiquity brings before us. 

We shall see them at Athens, where we shall 
be to-morrow. 

"We took leave of the " Vorwarts " and good 
Captain Verona, whom we met afterwards. 
We embarked on board the " Mahmoudie ". At 
seven p.m., we weighed anchor. Syra, which 
shines from its harbour to its acropolis like a 
large illuminated pyramid, quickly disappeared 
on the horizon. We had nothing but night and 
the stars ; we went down to our cabins ; and 
the next morning, at daybreak, we entered the 
Piraeus. 

There are, in my opinion, three unique sites 
in the world, Athens, Sparta, and Jerusalem. 
They alone have deeply impressed my soul. 
Neither Corinth with its gulf, nor Constanti- 
nople on its Bosphorus, nor Beyrout close to 
Lebanon^ nor Smyrna, nor Damascus, nor Baal- 
bec with its colossal ruins, nor Alexandria, 
have made my heart throb. I do not speak 
here of Nazareth, of the lake of Tiberias, of 
Jordan, and of all those places where I have 
followed the traces of the divine Master. I 
speak of the great cities of antiquity. All, in 
my estimation, sink before these great names. 
I do not know what Borne, in the middle of her 



64 



SCENERY OF ATHENS. 



vast campagna, might produce upon me ; I have 
not yet seen her. But the recollections of 
Athens, of Sparta, and of Jerusalem, have a 
magical influence upon my thoughts. There all 
is assembled, it would seem, by a Providence 
which has watched over the magnificence of her 
subjects. How beautifully encircled is Athens 
by Hymettus, Pentelicus, Parnassus, Cithseron, 
and the sea ! How the hill which serves as her 
Acropolis rises in a regular oval in the midst of 
the plain, to rest there as the most marvellous 
creation of art which, without exception, has 
issued from the hand of man ! What a magni- 
ficent pedestal to the Propylsea and to the 
Parthenon is this hill of marble, around which 
are grouped the other buildings of Athens ! 
Then that other hill, almost rivalling the first, 
where stands the Pnyx, the theatre where the 
destinies of the people were discussed, the 
tribune for orators, of which the steps chiselled 
out of the rock are still seen, such as they were 
when trodden by Pericles and Demosthenes ; 
the hill of temples for religious life ; the hill of 
the forum for political life, and then an immense 
expanse, with mountains of graceful outline 
bounding the horizon ! Such is Athens ! I did 
not weep in quitting Athens, as I did when 
leaving J erusalem. 

If I had one special home to choose in this 



ASSOCIATIONS. 



65 



world where everything seems good to me, and 
where every land is my country, the domain of 
the great human family, which is my family ; as 
a Christian, I should choose Jerusalem, a little 
corner at the foot of Mount Olivet, at a few 
paces from those aged olives which witnessed 
the agony of J esus ; as a man, I should choose 
the hill of the museum, at a little distance from 
the tribune where Demosthenes spoke, from the 
prison where Socrates drank hemlock, and oppo- 
site to the rock of the Areopagus, where 
St. Paul announced to the disciples of Plato the 
incarnation of the Word of God. 

I should not go to Sparta. As a man, I 
should feel myself too little ; I should find 
nothing there to touch my heart. I admire the 
virtues of Sparta, but I do not like them. Its 
patriotism is only great in my eyes, in its place, 
and in the narrow limits which will always be 
accorded to it by antiquity. My patriotism has 
no frontiers; it sees alone in all men the children 
of one Father who is in heaven ; and who was 
unknown at Sparta. 

Chateaubriand, the 25 th August, 1816, on 
visiting the Piraeus, with M. Fauvel, did not find 
a single vessel there. He only saw a dilapidated 
convent, and a wooden barrack, where a Turkish 
custom-house officer passed entire months without 
witnessing the arrival of a boat. Greece was then 

F 



66 



FIRST VIEW OF ATHENS. 



under the dominion of Turkey. When we, on 
the 16th October, 1850, mounted the deck of 
the " Mahmoudie," and the dawning day enabled 
us to distinguish the objects around us, we 
found ourselves in a vast harbour, forming the 
arc of a circle, which one might imagine drawn 
by a line ; a pretty town, with a handsome 
building for a custom-house ; a stone quay of 
good workmanship appeared before us, and this 
port, formerly so empty, was fall of fine vessels. 
We counted, besides the French frigate, nearly 
thirty large merchantmen of different nations, 
and a considerable number of small Greek 
vessels. 

Such is the Piraeus at this day. Our first 
glances from the deck of the " Mahmoudie" 
were directed to the Acropolis, which stood out 
from the horizon. 

Athens was before us ! In a few hours we 
should be there. 

When our luggage had been landed, and 
passed through the custom-house, which is 
quickly done in Greece, as all over the East, by 
the payment of a small sum, we entered light 
and rather elegant carriages, which conveved us 
from the Pirseus to Athens. A high road, like 
those of France, follows very nearly the ancient 
route. Fragments of the large wall, which 
united the PiraBus to the town, are still to be 



A GREEK KHAN. 



67 



seen. The impression upon my mind during 
the whole drive was a painful one. This vast 
plain is naked, and badly cultivated. I saw 
fields without labour, indicating a lazy people 
having a horror of agriculture ; fences badly 
made; scarcely any plantations; only a few vine 
plants ; and, further to our left, the forest of 
olive trees, planted by Minerva herself, and 
probably contemporaneous with the first ages of 
the occupation of Athens. 

About halfway we stopped at two khans, or 
Greek public-houses, where our horses rested, 
and where we drank raki. We also partook of 
a Greek preserve, of which I have forgotten the 
name, and which M. de Saulcy had praised 
much. It is a white, soft cake, that is cut into 
little squares, like the pate de jujubes. It has a 
most disagreeable, resinous taste. I do not say 
the same of raki, a distilled liquor of which I 
shall speak hereafter, and which we found very 
pleasant in our travels in the Peloponnesus. 

My friend who, amongst his recollections, has 
preeminently those which belong to the heart, 
recognised the Greek master of the khan, whom 
he had seen in his first tour : he called to him 
by name, and held out his hand to him. 

Travelling teaches us to love our fellow-men. 
We resumed our route, and soon Athens pre- 
sented herself to our sight. The approaches to 

p 2 



68 



TEMPLE OF THESEUS. 



the town were neither better cultivated nor 
better planted than the plain we had just tra- 
versed. Naked fields, without hedges, without 
fences, without trees, covered with withered 
herbs, over which a burning sun had passed, 
amongst which, here and there, grew the creep- 
ing caper, — all continued to sadden my sight, 
until we reached the first houses of the town. 
I now quickly forgot this arid, neglected soil, to 
turn my eyes upon the town and its buildings. 
We passed at a hundred yards from the Temple 
of Theseus, the most entire and best preserved 
monument of all Greece. I studied it after- 
wards. It is now the museum of the antiqui- 
ties of Athens, and, consequently, one of the 
most beautiful museums in the world. 

This building, which is small, isolated, and 
resplendent Avith the golden tint peculiar to 
Eastern buildings, strikes one with that majesty 
and grace, so characteristic of all which has 
issued from the hands of the Greeks. 

Above the temple of Theseus, we perceived 
the Acropolis, with its imposing mass. The 
Propylsea and the high tower of the middle ages 
hid the Parthenon from our sight. 

The view of Athens is least beautiful from 
the side from which we first saw it. It is in 
returning from the Isthmus of Corinth, having 
passed the monastery of Daphni, and at the foot 



HOTEL D'ORIENT. 



69 



of Cithseron, that Athens presents herself in 
such extreme beauty. It was from this point 
that Chateaubriand, after having traversed the 
whole of the Peloponnesus, first beheld her in all 
her glory. 

Themodern town is largerthan I had imagined ; 
it is not ill built, and there are two or three 
rather fine streets. A palm-tree rears itself in 
the middle of the longest of these streets. We 
were going to stay in the New Quarter, at the 
Hotel d'Orient, which had been occupied by 
King Otho before his palace was built. We 
there found a party of English, who were to go 
in two days, and were about, like ourselves, to 
visit the Peloponnesus. These indefatigable 
tourists take this kind of relaxation with admi- 
rable coolness. The two young Englishwomen 
whom we saw there, seemed to trouble them- 
selves no more with the dangers of such an 
expedition than at Paris they would have taken 
a drive to the Bois de Boulogne. 

M. de Saulcy found again the guide who had 
so nearly caused him to be assassinated at 
Egina ; but with a noble heart, he no longer 
retained the recollection ; and it was the same 
Antonio Nicolai, a little Greek with a dried-up 
face pitted with the small-pox, who was en- 
gaged to provide for our food and lodging, 
and to furnish us with horses during our tour 



70 



THE PROPYLiEA. 



in the Peloponnesus. This Greek asked an 
exorbitant sum, and treated us very badly. It 
was a good preparation for future hardships 
in Syria and Palestine. We never suffered so 
much as in Greece ; one can hardly believe the 
evidence of one's senses in a first drive about 
Athens. The marvellous Acropolis was there 
before us, as an irresistible attraction. From 
the top of the great staircase of the hotel we 
could see it develope its long, battlemented 
wall, above which rises the monumental type — 
the Parthenon. After having passed through 
the town, we began to climb the hill by a gentle 
ascent, by a road which has been recently con- 
structed. The ancient entrance to the Acropolis 
is obstructed by modern fortifications, and we 
ascend from the south side by rather rapid steps. 
You first find a little court where are lodged 
Greek veterans, the guardians of the sacred 
ruins. After crossing this, you see at the foot 
the Propylaea, an immense vestibule, a magni- 
ficent creation of art, that one admires less than 
the Parthenon, but which is executed with as 
much perfection. You have on your right, an 
immense pedestal, upon which is constructed a 
very small temple to Victory-apteros, that is to 
say, " without wings." On it is sculptured the 
famous bas-relief representing Victory, one of 
the most finished specimens of Grecian carving. 



THE PARTHENON. 



71 



When you have crossed the Propylsea, before 
reaching the Parthenon, you have a considerable 
space to traverse, ornamented with antique 
remains, very badly arranged in plaster. At 
length you are there. The side which you see 
first is not, as has been long thought, the prin- 
cipal facade. That facing the east, on the oppo- 
site side, is as usual, the facade of the greater 
proportion of the temples of antiquity. 

It is well known that the Parthenon is a 
rectangular parallelogram, ornamented with a 
peristyle and a portico. The columns are fluted ; 
and their shafts rest, without a base, upon three 
large steps which surround the building. The 
total length of the Parthenon is 218 feet, and 
its breadth 98 feet, measuring outside. The 
building is of the Doric order, the most noble 
and severe of the Grecian orders. The columns 
are 42 feet high, by a little less than 6 feet 
in diameter. To form an idea of the Parthenon, 
one must transport one's self to the Church of 
the Madeleine, at Paris. The Madeleine is also 
a Grecian temple with a peristyle, but of the 
Corinthian order. It must be borne in mind, 
that the columns of the Parthenon are not more 
than two feet higher than the bronze doors of 
the Madeleine, which occupy a little space only 
upon an immense facade. It must also be re- 
membered, that the church of the Madeleine is 



72 



THE PARTHENON. 



supported by an under-basement of nearly 12 
feet in height, while the base of the Parthenon 
is only composed of three steps, which do not 
give it more than 3 feet of height. With these 
disproportions of size, the Parthenon appears as 
high as the Madeleine. I do not here make any 
comparison between these two buildings, except 
as to the effect produced by their mass. It is 
one of the greatest triumphs of ancient art, that 
of giving to buildings an appearance of greater 
magnitude than they really possess, while it is 
one of the greatest marks of the inferiority of 
modern art, to make them appear small when 
in reality of colossal size, as all travellers admit. 
St. Peter's at Rome, the largest edifice of 
modern times, appears small ; and notwithstand- 
ing, the whole detail of it is so colossal, that the 
visitor can hide himself in the flutings of its 
pilasters. 



EARLY CHURCHES. 



73 



CHAPTEE IV. 

Early Churches. — G-othic Cathedrals. — Christian Art. — 
Allegorical Decorations. — The Metopes. — Marbles of 
Greece. — Microscopic Vegetation. — The Sacred Eoad. — ■ 
The Athenian Mountains. — Church of Daphni. — Early 
Architecture. — Dukes of Athens. — The Marquess of 
Montserrat. — Athens by Moonlight. — The Catholics of 
Athens. — Military Eete. — Patriotism of the Clergy. 

Christianity, which held temples in abhor- 
rence, and which constructed, at Baalbec, a 
basilica in the centre of the inclosure which pre- 
cedes its two temples, rather than enter into 
either of them, though they were of wonderful 
magnificence, made an exception in favour of 
the Parthenon. The Christians converted it 
into a church. One sees still the place where 
the circular apse closed in the principal door, 
making it face the east. The traces of paint- 
ings are also seen upon the walls of the cella, 
which became the nave of the church. The con- 
secration of the Parthenon to Christian worship 
reflects infinite honour upon the first ages of the 
church at Athens. No part of the admirable 
sculptures of this temple dedicated to Minerva 



74 



THE PARTHENON. 



had been mutilated. The statue of the goddess 
was no longer there, but the exquisite sculptures 
of Phidias were destined to last through ages, 
protected by the religion of Christ. The respect 
for art, notwithstanding its idolatrous stamp, 
professed by the Athenian Christians, forms a 
singular contrast to the anathemas of the narrow 
minds of our own times against other chefs-d'oeuvre 
which, like barbarians, they would proscribe. 

The Mahometans, who are known to be icono- 
clasts, and who destroy without mercy every 
representation of the human figure, had the 
same tolerance as the Christians towards the 
chefs-d'oeuvre of Greece. When they became 
masters of Greece, they took possession of the 
Parthenon, and converted it into a mosque. 
A little minaret was constructed upon one of 
the angles of the temple. The Venetians, at 
the siege of Athens, placed a battery upon the 
Pnyx ; a bomb fell upon the Parthenon, pene- 
trated its roof, and set fire to a barrel of gun- 
powder, which blew up the centre of this 
beautiful edifice. The immense shafts of the 
columns lean principally to the south side, in 
the same state as they were left by this terrible 
explosion. The two pediments, and a large 
part of the northern peristyle, were spared ; they 
are happily still the most conspicuous parts of 
the building. 



GOTHIC CATHEDRALS. 



75 



When will the Parthenon be restored ? When 
will the Hellenes, or rather when will Europe, 
replace the foundation stones of the beautiful 
marble from Pentelicus ? As the bullets that 
committed this vandalism were from civilized 
countries, will there not come a day when Europe 
will raise a subscription to help the poor Hel- 
lenes to repair their disaster ? We express the 
hope — we suggest the thought. 

I had quitted Europe a great admirer of 
Gothic architecture. Notre Dame de Chartres, 
Notre Dame de Paris, all our beautiful cathe- 
drals, with their prodigious spires, were to me a 
type of the supreme of beauty in art. I be- 
longed to that school, so numerous in this day, 
which popularly calls the ogival u the Christian 
art." I have completely changed my mind since 
I have studied the monuments of heathen anti- 
quity, and the Christian edifices erected in the 
East previously to the Gothic. There is no 
parallel between the Parthenon and our churches 
of the 13th century. Notwithstanding twenty 
years of admiration for the Gothic, I was obliged 
to yield to evidence, and to recognize in the 
ancients our masters in architecture and in 
sculpture. I shall speak later of the Christian 
basilicas and the Byzantine churches. 

That which gives to the buildings of Athens 
an incontestible superiority over all other con- 



76 



CHRISTIAN ART. 



ceptions of art, is their idealisation. Nothing 
is less sensuous that Grecian art. All that has 
been written under a contrary impression is 
puerile. Is it not commonly said that ancient 
art has made matter divine, and has spiritualized 
form? I do not deny that Christian art is 
eminently spiritual ; that her sculpture has an 
especial life of aspiration and of faith ; but that 
which has produced this spiritual essence in art 
is evidently religious belief. Who will venture 
to assert that the people of antiquity had not, 
in the highest degree, the sentiment of religion ? 
They were deceived in the object of their wor- 
ship; but this misdirected adoration was not 
less one of the strongest tendencies of human 
nature in all ages. It is useless to deny these 
things : all history, the whole of literature, all 
the art of antiquity, stand forth to attest its 
truth. I was forcibly struck at Athens by the 
chasteness of the sculptures of the high epoch. 
There is more of earthiness in the greater pro- 
portion of our Christs and our Virgins, and in 
hundreds of would-be religious subjects, than 
in the innumerable bas-reliefs of the Parthenon, 
the Museum, the Propylsea, and in those of the 
Temple of Theseus. A religious act is always 
chaste, because it is wholly symbolical. , Is it 
not true that the Christianity of the 10th, 11th, 
and 12th centuries sculptured beneath the cor- 



ALLEGORICAL DECORATIONS. 



77 



nices of our churches entablatures upon which 
were represented rude figures of all kinds ? 
Did they not place on the capitals, at the en- 
trance of churches, on one side doves seeking 
holiness and life in a chalice, and on the other, 
representations which in this day would not be 
tolerated ? 

Who has ever set down as a crime in the 
middle ages, the language spoken by carved 
stone to generations of barbarians, who re- 
quired to see, as it were, an idea, to enable 
them to understand it. "When the 1 2th century 
arrived, and the human mind began to awaken 
from its slumber, see how Christianity aban- 
doned by degrees this gross symbolism ; listen 
to St. Bernard proscribing these representations 
made for barbarians; see the ogival art forsaking 
symbolism more and more, till modern times, 
when it can be no longer practised, and is 
now but a fanciful imitation left us, which well- 
meaning men, in their simplicity, copy ; and in 
so doing imagine that by imitating the capitals 
of the 12th century, they are following Chris- 
tian art. 

Had not ancient art its own symbolism also ? 
and would it be difficult to demonstrate that 
there were for it, as there have been for us, 
hieratic types consecrated to its use. 

Let us leave these exaggerated theories, and 



78 



THE METOPES. 



these systematic condemnations of a past which 
has bequeathed to us such precious remains. 

I was never wearied of admiring the numerous 
Metopes upon the frieze of the Parthenon, the 
special work of Phidias. They have, for the 
most part, descended from the place which they 
occupied upon the building, and are ranged 
in rows in the cella. All these figures pre- 
eminently express two things, calmness and 
dignity ; not the calmness which is merely 
coldness, nor the dignity which expresses dis- 
dain, but these two things in their highest ideali- 
zation. Nevertheless, the ideal of the ancients 
sinks into nothing before the Christian ideal. 
These exquisite representations of antiquity are 
without inspiration. They have an indefinable 
expression of greatness ; but it is human gran- 
deur, with its earthly destiny ; you never see 
in one of their beautiful marbles what is so 
common in even the most ordinary statues of 
the middle ages, the " Cupio dissolvi et esse cum 
Christo." Not one of them aspires to a better 
country ; not one has ever seemed to say : " O 
God ! I love Thee ! " There lies the incontes- 
table inferiority of this perfect art, by the side 
of the coarsest head of a saint, which some good 
monk may have chiselled upon the capitals of 
his cloister, or upon the portal of his church. 

It was in studying these magnificent bas- 



N 



MARBLES OF GREECE. 79 

reliefs, that I discovered the microscopic vege- 
tation to which the Parthenon and all Eastern 
edifices owe their beautiful golden hue. The 
theories built upon the subject of this tint of 
the marbles of the Parthenon are well known. 
Some have asserted that this beautiful building 
had been painted, and that the pale yellow 
colouring was the only remains of the antique 
painting. In fact, some traces of painting, par- 
ticularly in the compartments of the ceiling, 
are still visible. Others assert that it is the 
effect of the sun itself, which has had the privi- 
lege of tinting with its heat the marble in this 
manner. It is, however, nothing of the kind : 
it is a lichen, with imperceptible organs, which 
botanists up to this hour have not described, 
which extends in immense layers over all the 
marbles of Greece, either carved by the chisel, 
as in buildings, or in a natural state at the side 
of mountains. The numerous specimens of this 
lichen which I have brought from the Parthenon, 
from the old enclosure of the Temple of Solomon, 
and from the ruins of Baalbec, place the fact 
beyond a doubt ; and these are the observations 
which brought me to this interesting discovery. 
The bas-reliefs of Phidias have especially this 
beautiful golden tint, which contributes so much 
to give the appearance of a velvety softness 
which it is difficult to describe. And when, at 



80 



TINTING OF THE MARBLES. 



different epochs, the projecting parts, such as 
the noses or fingers, had been broken off, I 
observed that the yellow tint had covered the 
broken parts, and that they differed in no respect 
from the hollow parts of the bas-reliefs which 
had never suffered mutilation. I might con- 
clude from this, that the colour was not paint, 
as the marble, when broken first, is of dazzling 
whiteness, and in time becomes as yellow as the 
rest. This was conclusive. I also observed, 
that after the habit of all lichens, this colouring 
penetrated the fissures of the marble wherever 
it was broken in any part, so that in scaling off 
the outside, you find that the two interior sides 
have equally received this general tint, and that 
the tint diminishes in intensity with the size of 
the crevice. This colour follows the habit of 
lichens, which generally cover the rocks, and 
penetrate the imperceptible fissures. 

I afterwards studied what would be the action 
of the sun upon the columns of the building, 
and the following is the result. The columns 
placed to the south are perfectly white on those 
parts which are for the greatest length of time 
exposed to the burning rays of the sun. By 
degrees, they become yellow on those parts 
where the sun shines upon them with less ardent 
rays. In short, on those parts scarcely reached 
by the sun, the yellow tint has become blackish, 



THE LEPRAUIA. 81 

and there are frequently long, blackish lichens 
trailing along, well known by botanists, extend- 
ing in long, flat layers, over the walls where 
water or the rain has remained the longest time. 
These facts, thus arrived at, led me to the fol- 
lowing conclusions : — Since the marble, in those 
parts least exposed to the sun, becomes nearly 
black, and we know that this colouring is de- 
rived from the lichen called Lepraria ; since the 
marble retains its whiteness where it is most 
exposed to the sun, and that the yellow tint is 
only strongly marked in the intermediate parts ; 
it follows that it is a lichen, which, needing 
moisture, cannot vegetate under the burning 
action of the sun, on the front of the column ; 
it therefore vegetates the more strongly on those 
parts where the marble is most sheltered from 
the heat 

I had here the solution of my problem. 
Afterwards, upon the north side of the walls of 
Jerusalem, I detached fragments of mortar that 
had been carefully polished by the trowel. The 
lichen on the stones which form these walls was 
spread upon the mortar itself, and had given to 
it the same golden tint as to the stone. It is 
not, therefore, the action of heat which has thus 
gilded the marble, since the columns of the Par- 
thenon, on those parts most exposed to the suns 
rays, remain white ; and upon the walls of Jeru- 

G 



82 MICROSCOPIC VEGETATION. 

salem I found the same tints upon the northern 
side, which is never warmed by the sun's rays. 
Men of microscopical science will allow me to 
give the name of Lepraria Parthenoniaca to this 
lichen, if, as I have reason to think, no other 
botanist has been beforehand with me in the 
discovery of this microscopic parasite. 

It is a little plant, of which the wonderfully 
fine net-work covers the marble wrought by the 
hand of man ; and which gives to oriental build- 
ings the warm colouring denied to those of 
Europe. 

Some of my readers will perhaps smile at the 
importance I attach to this discovery. I can 
only wish them the happiness of similar research, 
and above all, that they may comprehend how 
much such studies raise the mind to God, in 
beholding with what profusion the creative power 
has multiplied vegetation and life. Insects, also, 
doubtless live in this lichen, which can only be 
discerned by a powerful magnifying glass. One 
single block of one of the columns of the Par- 
thenon is a continent for the inhabitants of this 
little world. They venture, doubtless, to make 
the tour, and to traverse those parts of the 
marble deprived of all vegetation, as a man 
adventures amongst the sands of a vast desert. 
And if they reach the black lichens on the side 
opposite to the light, they find themselves, as it 



THE SACRED ROAD. 



83 



were, in immense forests, which astonish them 
by their prodigious height. Perhaps these in- 
sects live only one of our hours, and this hour 
is the term of their life. God has created all 
these little things ; but they are great to the 
eye of a thinking man, and of a Christian. 

October 19. — We have to-day taken two 
delightful drives. Hired carriages took us up 
at the Hotel d'Orient, and, as in the best days 
of Greece, we found a good road, which con- 
ducted us to the monastery of Daphni. It is 
the ancient Sacred Road. A marble, with this 
inscription, in beautiful antique characters 1 — 
ATI A OAO% — is inserted above the lintel of the 
door of a garden at a little distance from the 
town. In leaving Athens, an abundant spring 
issues forth from a little eminence ; its waters 
are conveyed to the gardens below, amongst 
which is the Jardin des Plantes of the capital of 
Greece. I shall visit this garden hereafter : it 
has a tolerably good nursery of trees. The road 
which leads to it, after leaving the fountain, of 
which I cannot give the modern name, is lined 
with magnificent bead-trees. The burning sun 
of Greece had passed over them, without de- 
stroying their graceful foliage. I had great 
pleasure in seeing this tree of the New "World, 

G 2 



84 



THE ATHENIAN MOUNTAINS. 



giving its friendly shade to the despoiled plain 
of Athens. 

The peoples of modern times owe much to 
Greece ; and they have nobly shed their blood 
for her in the "War of Independence. Now that 
they have given her that first of blessings — 
liberty, they can assist her in adorning herself 
with flowers. 

The equipages of Athens have not quite the 
freshness nor the elegance of those seen in the 
Champs Elysees. They are not, however, the 
less convenient for their unpretending appear- 
ance. In a short time they conveyed us to the 
foot of Corydalos, one of those mountains form- 
ing the immense belt beneath which Athens 
stands. What would Chateaubriand have said, 
when he entered the desert plain of Athens, in 
1806, by the same sacred road which we had 
just passed along, if any one had then predicted 
that before half a century a brilliant modern 
Athens would replace that which he found 
forming the domain of a black slave of the 
Seraglio ; and that we should drive in European 
carriages to wander about the ruins of the temple 
of Daphni? 

At this day a convent replaces the ancient 
temple, of which nothing remains but some base- 
ments, devoid of interest. The convent itself is 



CHURCH OF DAPHNI. 



85 



nothing more than a ruin. It has no more 
chance of being raised up again than the temple. 
The two ideas which caused their construction 
are either dead or dying ■ but that which cannot 
perish, either in the edifice or the idea, is the 
beautiful Greek church of Daphni. While my 
joyous companions were making a rich spoil of 
insects, I entered the convent. I was received 
by three or four spectres, clad in black, with 
pale, wrinkled, sallow faces, whom I took for 
monks newly shaven, and aged with fasting. 
I addressed them in a few words of our univer- 
sity Greek, which they could not understand. 
This was not very flattering to a Hellenist who 
reads his Demosthenes with tolerable ease. Not 
being able to make myself understood by Greeks 
when speaking to them in Greek, I had recourse 
to the universal language of signs; I pointed to 
the church; my sign was understood, and they 
opened the door for me. One of the spectres 
remained with me a considerable time, to do 
the honours of the old building, while I drew 
the plan of the church. Wearied with my long 
explorations, he left me from time to time, re- 
turning sometimes alone, sometimes with the 
other spectres. It was only at the moment of 
quitting the enclosure of the monastery that 
one of these mysterious beings having extended 
its hand to ask alms, I concluded, from the 



86 



EARLY ARCHITECTURE. 



feminine arm timidly extended from beneath 
the black tatters that covered it, that these pre- 
tended monks, whom I had addressed as fathers, 
were old women, who had taken refuge in 
Daphni. 

The church of Daphni may be studied as one 
of the types of Christian Greek art of a good 
era. It is small, like all Greek churches, but 
at the same time larger than many which I 
afterwards visited at Athens. The edifice 
has nowhere greater length in the clear than 
sixty-eight feet by forty-two in width; but 
with so little size the effect is perfect. Ima- 
gine everything that can suggest religious ideas, 
all that is simple, pure, and mysterious; enough 
light, proportions admirably calculated, and 
grace in every detail, — such is Daphni. 

One asks one's self, when the basilicas have 
retained the antique form, why the Greek 
churches have nothing that reminds one of the 
principles of regular architecture. There is as 
little resemblance between Daphni and the Par- 
thenon, as between Notre Dame at Paris and 
the Madeleine. 

The only thing that Christian art has visibly 
borrowed from the antique is the interior ar- 
rangement; the vestibule at the entrance, the 
cella after the vestibule, and the central dome 
serving as sacellum. As to the rest, a Christian 



THE DUKES OF ATHENS. 



87 



church has nothing that recalls the temples of 
paganism. 

The cupola of Daphni is decorated with mo- 
saics of great beauty. Upon a golden ground 
stands out in bold relief the Christ, of colossal 
size, in a circular aureola, the head surrounded 
by a cruciferous nimbus, and blessing after the 
Greek manner. At the right and left are six- 
teen prophets, The dome is lighted by sixteen 
windows, which afford a subdued light. The 
aisles, the narrow and mysterious apses, are 
very imperfectly lighted; but the light which 
comes from heaven falls in floods upon the 
Christ himself, the source of all light ; and 
upon the prophets, who are the precursors of 
the gospel. The four pendents that support the 
cupola are also in mosaic, upon a gold ground. 
Two are a little degraded; the other two repre- 
sent the Annunciation, and the Baptism of the 
Saviour. The multiplicity of sanctuaries at 
the end of the church especially strikes the 
observer. 

The Dukes of Athens, at the time of the occu- 
pation by the Franks, were interred at Daphni ; 
their sepulchral chamber lies on the left. It 
is entered by a door which opens into the 
porch. The sarcophagus of one of the Latin 
chiefs of the crusades is used at this day as a 
bin for corn. I sketched a bas-relief, in the 



88 



MARQUESS OF MONTSEREAT. 



form of an escutcheon, which decorates the 
front of this curious sarcophagus. It repre- 
sents a Latin cross upon a base formed by- 
two low steps, from which spring some branches. 
The cross is charged at the top with two fleurs- 
de-lis, of an elongated shape. I had the plea- 
sure of finding this old emblem of the glory of 
France on the soil of Greece. The first of the 
dukes of Athens who was of French blood, was 
Otho de la Hoche, who received the investiture 
of Marquess of Montserrat, about 1204. It 
was this Otho, or one of his descendants, who 
has reposed in this tomb. The form of the 
fleurs-de-lis distinctly gives the date of the 
thirteenth century. 

The monastery of Daphni is enclosed by walls, 
of which one part rests upon the wall of the 
ancient temple. But outside this enclosure, in 
advancing towards the foot of the mountain, is 
a very small isolated church, more ancient than 
that of the monastery, which I closely examined. 
It is possible that it may have escaped the 
observation of archaeologists. It is formed of a 
simple nave, and of a pentagonal sanctuary. 
The windows are semicircular. 

In the evening, on our return to Athens, we 
were conducted to the Acropolis by our worthy 
countryman Colonel Touret, who wished us to 
admire the effect of the monuments of the time 



ATHENS BY MOONLIGHT. 



89 



of Pericles by moonlight. It was like a fairy 
scene. We there passed one of those hours 
the charm of which is indescribable. The 
Parthenon was even more grand. Its imposing 
mass stood out from the shadows with a splen- 
dour that fascinated our eyes. The little tem- 
ples of Pandrosus and of the Erectheum, the 
majestic Propylsea, with the temple of Victory- 
apteros, appeared, beneath this soft light, of 
most exquisite beauty. The old feudal tower 
reared itself, gigantic and terrible, above the 
Propylsea, the symbol of that warlike and bar- 
barous, yet mighty feudalism, which caused the 
East to tremble at the time of the crusades. 
What a spectacle ! and what recollections ! 

Besides, there we were at liberty, in the 
bosom of liberated Greece ; it was a lover of 
Greece who had nobly fought for her, who 
guided us amongst these wonderful ruins, proud 
of having saved them in the name of France 
and of civilisation. He showed us with pride 
the veterans of the War of Independence, at 
this day the guardians of the Acropolis, whom 
he called his old companions in arms. I picked 
up amidst the dSbris, one of the bullets which 
had been fired by the Turks against the citadel. 
I brought it to France as a souvenir of the ser- 
vitude and of the misfortunes which, during so 
many ages, had weighed upon Greece. 



90 



SPLENDID SCENERY. 



I give up in despair the attempt to describe 
the view of Attica from the top of the Acropolis 
by moonlight, under a transparent sky, studded 
with brilliant stars. The nights of Greece have 
always been admired — I have often with dif- 
ficulty torn myself from their enchantment. 

I have preserved, as one of the most treasured 
recollections for my old age, should God grant 
it to me, the image of this marvellous Acropolis, 
rearing itself as in the days of its splendour, in 
the midst of that vast plain where the city of 
Minerva sleeps an eternal sleep. There will 
still be a charm for my enfeebled imagination 
in this picture, which will reappear before me 
without an effort, with all the distinctness of 
outline, which is so deeply engraven upon my 
memory. After such things, there is nothing 
more sublime than that which relates to the soul 
and to God. 

October 20. — This day, Sunday, I have been 
to celebrate mass in the Catholic church of 
Athens. It is situated at the foot of the Acro- 
polis, at a little distance from the Tower of the 
Winds. 

Nothing can be smaller or more insignificant 
than this church ; it is a modern building, with- 
out any kind of architecture, and completely 
bad. I met with the kindest welcome from the 



THE CATHOLICS OF ATHENS. 



91 



cure of Athens, who gave me, with the greatest 
willingness, all the information I wished for 
as to the religious state of the city. There are 
only about two thousand Catholics at Athens, 
and the greater proportion of them are not 
Greeks ; they are either Italians or Maltese. The 
preaching is not in Greek but in Italian. This 
is an excellent plan to prevent the Greeks, who 
have a strong feeling of nationality, from ever 
hearing the Catholics preach- The cure of 
Athens complained much of the Greek clergy, 
and of the prejudices which they encourage 
among the people against the Church of Rome. 
" If you wish to judge of it yourself," said he, 
" you have only to walk along the streets in 
your cassock, and on all sides you will hear called 
out a Greek word, meaning executioner. The 
Greek clergy have succeeded in persuading the 
people that if they receive extreme unction from 
the hands of a Catholic priest, it is sufficient to 
cause death." 

I did not think it necessary to verify the fact ; 
and I set it down as I had it from the good 
cure, who loaded me with attentions, and did me 
the honours of his presbytery with the kindest 
cordiality. 

He expressed the greatest joy at the idea 
of the reconciliation of the Eastern churches 
with that of Rome. He said that he thought 



92 



MILITARY FETE. 



that our commercial council might obtain this 
happy result ; he sighed over the enfeebled state 
of Catholicism in Greece, and he understood 
that some great plan could alone put an end to 
an unhappy schism, which would last on for 
ages if one shrunk from facing it. I had many 
conferences with this worthy man, who united 
great apparent simplicity with considerable 
shrewdness. The information he gave me was 
fully confirmed by Abbe Marinelli. Some years 
before he had made use of the influence of 
the Austrian Consul at Athens, to solicit the 
bishopric of Syra; but men in high places in 
the church wrote to the Propaganda against 
this application, which caused its failure. 

In the evening we witnessed a little public 
fete on the Place d'armes of Athens. This fete 
consisted in a serenade that the bands of the 
regiments quartered in the town give every 
Sunday to King Otho and his young Queen, 
The King was at that time in Bavaria, and the 
Queen governed the little Greek State with the 
provisional title of Regent. 

Colonel Touret, who commands the garrison 
of Athens, had promised us that a national air 
of great beauty should be performed. It struck 
us as remarkably original and graceful. The 
Queen arrived on horseback, attended by an 
escort ; she was received with numerous vivas. 



PATRIOTISM OF THE CLERGY. 



93 



There were present a crowd of Athenian fashion- 
ables. This is the Champs Elysees of the 
capital of Greece. I had the pleasure of seeing 
several ladies of rank of the first families of 
Athens, in their ancient national costume • but 
this is wearing away, and the younger ladies 
have adopted the French fashions. 

When Greece was constituted a kingdom, the 
Powers of Europe could not contrive better 
than to give a Catholic King and a Protestant 
Queen to the Greek nation, which detests both 
Catholics and Protestants. When we know 
what is, amongst every people, the influence of 
the established church of a country, we may 
have an idea of the secret opposition felt by a 
Greek population to a royalty that is doubly 
heretical in its eyes. The Greek clergy have 
conducted themselves with admirable patriotism 
in the War of Independence. The anecdotes, 
without number, of their heroic devotedness, 
have rendered them extremely popular. The 
Greek church has, therefore, great power; the 
sentiment of religion, of which it is the depo- 
sitory, is, together with the national honour, the 
sole principle of cohesion in the heart of this 
people. If Greece were brought back to the 
great Catholic fraternity by the blessed aid of a 
general council, the new position in which it 
would place the clergy, would put it in the 



RENEWED ACTIVITY. 



position of exercising great influence upon the 
temporal destinies of the country. Catholic 
activity would have then a vast field, and before 
long she would realise the work of civilisation 
and of progress which is demanded by the in- 
active state in which Greece is slumbering, not- 
withstanding that she possesses such elements 
of prosperity and greatness. 



THE ILISSUS. 



95 



CHAPTER V. 

The Ilissus. — Convent of Penteli. — Marbles of Paros. — 
The Cephisus. — Our Guide Antonio. — Gulf of Salamis. 
Eleusis. — Pass of Kaki Skala. — Isthmus of Corinth. — 
The Isthmian Games. — Fountain of Venus. — Acro- 
Corinthus. — Ruins of Mycense. — Tomb of Atreus. — The 
Gate of Lions. — Cyclopean Walls. — Tirynthus. — Nauplia. 
— Pirst Greek Parliament. — Marshes of Lerna. 

October 21. — On this day our course was 
directed to Pentelicus. It is from the sides of 
this mountain that the magnificent blocks of 
marble have been taken, from which the monu- 
mental edifices of Athens have been formed. 

The road leading to Pentelicus is tolerably 
good ; we had passed along it in the caleches 
which had conveyed us to Daphni. This time 
we followed the steep banks of the bed of the 
Ilissus. Some oleanders were still in flower on 
its banks. One cannot wonder that in the middle 
of autumn, after a burning summer's sun, this 
rivulet, which I would willingly call a river, as 
it is more famous than most other rivers, should 



96 



CONVENT OF PENTELI. 



not be of larger size. I shall not contradict 
Chateaubriand upon that point. We crossed 
the Ilissia, which is a very beautiful structure ; 
there, in the middle of a wood of myrtles as tall 
as our copsewood, of firs, and of the arbutus in 
flower, we found, upon reaching the first spur 
of Pentelicus, a vast edifice, as yet unfinished, 
upon the door of which you read in large letters 
the word " Plaisance." This palace, built by the 
Duchess of Plaisance, who gave it her own 
name, is a long, square elevation, in tolerable 
taste. We were informed that this lady had 
renounced Christianity to become a Jewess. If 
this feminine caprice sounded strange to us, we 
judged otherwise of her instincts as a person of 
taste. What an exquisite retreat ! What nature ! 
What beautiful tints ! What a sun ! 

From Plaisance to the convent of Penteli the 
distance is very short. It was under the tufted 
trees, close to an abundant spring, one of the 
sources of the Ilissus, that we made our halt. 
The joyous group commenced their pillage 
according to their individual taste. I plunged 
into the wood of Penteli, following the stream, 
in which I picked up some conferva?. I 
botanized most successfully. We then followed 
the road towards the quarries of Pentelicus ; but 
the sun was already sinking towards the moun- 
tains ; we stopped every moment before the 



I 

I 

j 

THE MARBLES OF FAROS. 9 7 

treasures of this animated nature, and the 
smiling vegetation before us. Laden with insects 
and flowers, we regained the road to Athens. 

If the high duties of the custom-house did 
not stop the importation of Grecian marble, the 
statuaries of France would have the beautiful 
marble from Pentelicus upon very advantageous 
terms. Its transportation would be easy ; the 
quarry is at a very short distance from the 
Piraeus. It would be the same as to the marble 
of Paros, which surpasses that of Pentelicus in 
brilliancy and fineness. 

It is a melancholy fact that, thanks to un- 
meaning tariffs, our artists know of no other 
marbles for sculpture than those of Italy, which 
are also heavily taxed. It frequently happens 
with us that the state is compelled to furnish 
marble for the statues which it orders. 

A few years ago, some Athenian merchants 
despatched to Marseilles two vessels laden with 
marble from Paros. This marble, of inferior 
quality, was notwithstanding of such beauty, 
that the. custom-house would not apply to it the 
tariff of the second quality of Carrara marble. 
In consequence of the onerous obligation of 
paying 326 francs 26 centimes per cubic yard, 
the vessels were obliged to return to Greece 
with their freight. It is easy to be under- 
stood that the reduction of the duties upon the 



98 



THE CEPHISI3S, 



beautiful Grecian marbles, would give rise to 
a considerable commerce between Greece and 
France. These marbles would arrive at Mar- 
seilles or at Cette, from whence they would be 
conveyed to Bordeaux by the canal of Langue- 
doc. The merchant navy of Greece, which 
numbers more than four hundred vessels, and 
which are now almost all bound for England, to 
convey corn and fruits, would take the route of 
our ports in the Mediterranean ; and they would 
take back the produce of our manufactures, 
which are celebrated both in Greece and the 
East. The state would soon be indemnified for 
the reduction of duties, by the considerable 
sums that would arise from the increase in our 
commercial relations. The Greek merchant- 
men, attracted to England by the absence of 
duties, would reach far more easily the ports of 
France, with the certainty of the same benefits. 
It is a miserable policy so entirely to exclude 
Greece from the French market, 

October 22. — I walked and botanized near 
the Cephisus. It is divided into numerous 
trenches, for the purpose of irrigating the plain. 
The gattilier (Vitex agnus castas) , was in flower 
upon its banks. The Greeks were accustomed 
to strew the floors of their temples with it, on 
the fetes of Ceres. Above the Cephisus extend 



OUR GUIDE ANTONIO. 



99 



the vineyards of Athens. Their richness and 
strength of vegetation is wonderful. Although 
the vintage was over, a quantity of grapes 
still remained, probably because they had not 
been sufficiently ripe. The cotton plant is also 
cultivated in this plain. The olive-trees are 
numerous : they form a forest following the 
two banks of the Cephisus, and it extends far 
out in the direction of the Piraeus. It would be 
difficult to ascertain the age of these olive- 
trees ; some must be of great antiquity; perhaps 
even contemporaneous with the first plantation 
of this tree upon the soil of Greece. The olive 
never dies. They had been entirely frozen 
during the preceding winter, but the enormous 
trunks of the trees had not suffered. We saw 
the commencement of the pruning of the naked 
branches. There are several little churches 
scattered here and there on the plain of the 
Cephisus, but they are almost all deserted. 

October 24. — At ten o'clock in the morning 
we left Athens for our grand tour in the Pelo- 
ponnesus. The famous Antonio is the general- 
in- chief of the expedition. Our bodies and 
souls are confided to his keeping : he has made 
a precise calculation, so that our bodies should 
not actually die from hunger. As to our lives, 
they are in the safe keeping of God. We have, 

h 2 



100 



GULF OF SALAMIS. 



nevertheless, an escort of armed men on foot, 
who are to defend us in case of need. The little 
Greek has only forgotten to count us, so that 
since the very first night we have not had a 
sufficient number of beds carried by the mules 
for our party. We are therefore obliged in turn 
to sleep upon the ground. The rascal does not 
seem to trouble himself about it in the least. 

We passed Daphni, which we knew already. 
Soon we defiled upon the Gulf of Salamis, which 
we only quitted on reaching the isthmus of 
Corinth. This peaceful bay, the scene of one 
of the most memorable battles of antiquity, is 
beautifully encircled by mountains. From the 
sacred road by which we passed, and of which 
the ancient tracks show themselves here and 
there, we saw the height where the Prince of 
Princes had caused his throne to be placed, that 
he might the better contemplate the terrible 
combat, which caused his shame, and reflected 
eternal honour on Greece. 

We reposed for a short time at the khan 
during the great heat. It is placed at a short 
distance from the sea. Magnificent blocks of 
marble lay at a few feet from the khan. They 
are the remains of the tomb of Strato. On 
another occasion, when I went alone to Eleusis, 
I took an impression of the beautiful characters 
upon this tomb, which are very well preserved. 



ELEUSIS. 



101 



It is not known when the tomb of the warrior 
to whom his grateful country had elevated this 
monument, was despoiled. It must have been 
magnificent, judging from its ruins. 

Here is Eleusis, the city of the mysteries of 
Ceres ! Chateaubriand, in his beautiful lan- 
guage, says that " this is the spot which 
should be regarded with greater reverence than 
any other in Greece ; for here was taught the 
unity of God, and this place was witness of the 
grandest effort ever made by man in the cause 
of liberty." 

Of the magnificent temple, we only saw the 
most uninteresting remains. 

Silence and barbarism now reign upon this 
shore, where in former times were gathered in 
majestic pomp the brilliant processions of the 
Athenians. From the gulf of Salamis to Eleusis 
an immense plain extends, which, doubtless, for- 
merly was carefully cultivated : the mountain 
streams were brought down to Eleusis by an 
aqueduct, of which the arches still remain. The 
sandy part of the plain, nearest to the sea, is 
occupied by rich vineyards. I found the beau- 
tiful mandrake of Eleusis in flower. It differs 
entirely from the mandrake of Palestine. Its 
leaves are more elongated, and smoother ; the 
peduncle is also longer ; the petals are thinner 



102 



PASS OF KAKI SKALA. 



at the base, and the whole corolla is lighter. 
The leaves of the mandrake of Palestine are 
more folded and hairy ; the calyx is also hairy. 
No plant has a greater power of vegetation. 
However small a fragment of root may he left 
in the ground, even at the surface, it immedi- 
ately sends out a sucker. The roots that I 
pulled up, remained in a case more than a year. 
It was only necessary to put them in the earth 
at Paris, to make them throw out shoots imme- 
diately. It is one of the pretty flowers of 
Greece. I only saw them amongst the vines of 
Eleusis. We arrived at Megara at seven o'clock 
in the evening. A wretched town ; a bad 
night; suffocating heat; and insects that de- 
voured us. 

October 25. — After Megara, the country is 
a desert, but of infinite variety. We were shut 
in between mountains and the sea. It was 
necessary to cross the defile of Kaki Skala. It 
is, in fact, a staircase in the rocks, where horses 
might easily fall. We descended this dangerous 
passage on foot. We went to dine and sleep 
under an immense fig-tree, which was still in 
full leaf. We started in an hour for Calamaki. 
We continually traversed woods of pines, of 
myrtles, of skinos, and arbutus. We always 



CALAMAKL 



103 



had, on our left, the beautiful sea of Salamis, 
which I could not help regarding with love, for 
it seemed to speak to me of glory. 

Calamaki, where we passed the night, is 
upon the isthmus of Corinth. It is an important 
station, and one which will become more so. 
The high road which crosses the isthmus starts 
from thence, and communicates, on the opposite 
side, with Loutraki, another port where the 
Mediterranean steamers touch, on their voyage 
to the Gulf of Lepanto. Some wretched car- 
riages convey the travellers, on their landing, 
to Calamaki, from whence they easily reach the 
Piraeus by small sailing-vessels. There is here a 
custom-house and a barrack. 

October 26. — Grand recollections were again 
opening upon us, and were continued by the 
succession of deep emotions which every spot in 
this immortal peninsula would awaken. There, 
simple tribes have had a history which has re- 
sounded throughout the civilised world, as much 
as that of any great people. For my heart of a 
Christian and of a priest, I sought for Cenchrsea. 
This modest name recals to the mind St. Paul 
landing in the Peloponnesus, and wending 
his way towards Corinth, to found there a 
Christian church. I was about to tread the 
same soil that this remarkable conqueror had 



104 



ISTHMUS OF CORINTH. 



trod, with his projects for the dominion of 
souls, in the heart of the most voluptuous city 
of Greece. Corinth is only a shadow of her 
former self ; but the Word, preached by the 
fisher of men, has not ceased to echo for eighteen 
centuries, to enlighten men and to console them. 
The gospel announced by the poor and humble 
tent-maker still constitutes the moral grandeur 
of these sublime regions. It has given them 
the energy needful for an obstinate struggle 
with their oppressors ; and in a few days we shall 
see, in the bosom of the mountains, the monas- 
tery whence issued the first signal for the deli- 
verance of Greece. 

We had seen, the evening before — and we 
frequently saw in Greece — entire villages aban- 
doned, where the inhabitants had perished to 
the last man, beneath the Turkish cimitar. This 
brutal people made war with incredible bar- 
barity, and their memory is held in execration 
throughout Greece. 

The isthmus of Corinth is a unique site in 
Greece. The north and south of the Grecian 
world had there their political and intellectual 
junction, as the peninsula and the continent 
their physical junction. We first saw the re- 
mains of the massive wall which crossed the 
isthmus. Chateaubriand is mistaken in say. 
ing that this place is called Xamilia, in 



THE ISTHMIAN GAMES. 



105 



allusion to the wall being six miles in length. 
Xamilia is much farther off ; we shall speak of 
it presently. 

We went to see the immense Theatre, of which 
nothing but fragments remain : we drove to the 
ancient Stadium, which is not far off. It is 
there, as in the glorious days of Greece ; only 
without its porticos and its sumptuous adorn- 
ments I but the shape of the ground indicates 
its position without doubt. All the ground 
about is barren, and covered here and there with 
brambles. How many generations, neverthe- 
less, in the most brilliant era of ancient civilisa- 
tion, have come here to celebrate the national 
f£tes, the Isthmian Games instituted by Theseus, 
and rendered immortal by the lyric songs of 
Pindar ! 

We did not fail, after having quitted the 
isthmus, to visit the village of Xamilia. A 
ploughed field, before you reach the village, was 
covered with some magnificent meadow-saffron 
in flower. After a good deal of parley with the 
Greeks, it was agreed that they should search, 
in our presence, some of the tombs of the plain. 

We left the village with our men armed with 
tools. It was agreed that we should give a 
certain sum of money for each tomb that should 
contain vases or other antiquities. Most of the 
tombs that they opened for us had already 



106 



XAMILIA. 



been plundered by them, They expected to 
make us the dupes of their tricks. They set to 
work, after having struck upon the lid of a 
sarcophagus, under an immense bed of earth ; 
but when the earth had been removed, they 
found nothing in the tomb. We were very 
much disappointed. However, at the moment 
that we determined to leave them there, and 
refuse them their promised reward, as they 
had made no discoveries, they directed our steps 
towards a tomb, which they probably were before 
aware of, and found in it some valuable remains. 

I have no doubt, that every traveller who 
traverses Xamilia is conducted by his guide to 
these tombs, so often rummaged, where he be- 
comes, like us, the object of a similar mystifica- 
tion. The guides have a good understanding 
with the inhabitants of Xamilia for this profit- 
able exploration. We bought, in the village, 
some pretty antique vases. These men live 
upon the bones of their fathers. 

On quitting Xamilia we turned towards 
Corinth. We had seen the Acro-Corinthus 
from the entrance of the isthmus. It is a high 
mountain, surmounted by a strong fortress, 
standing at an elevation of 1800 feet; its walls 
occupy a large area. We had no curiosity to 
ascend to this citadel, which is modern, but as 
we had still three hours of daylight, we devoted 



FOUNTAIN OF VENUS 



107 



them to the remains of ancient Corinth. The 
Fountain of Venus still falls in a beautiful and 
abundant cascade from a chalky rock. Under 
the Turkish dominion, the Pacha had constructed 
gardens beneath the fountain. They have been 
destroyed, and the fountain is now open to the 
public. To arrive at it, we traversed a part of 
modern Corinth, of which the houses, ruined by 
the Turks, have never been rebuilt. I felt 
saddened by this spectacle. The amphitheatre 
of Corinth is immense ; it is formed by the 
natural shape of the rock, in which the arena has 
been scooped out. The steps have disappeared. 

On our return to the town, we went to 
examine the remains of the only temple which 
still stands at Corinth. In the time of Pausa- 
nias they numbered sixteen. It is impossible to 
see a more imposing ruin. The most interesting 
feature is, that the fluted Doric columns of this 
temple, with very wide capitals, offer to us the 
type of the most ancient style of Grecian archi- 
tecture. When Stuart sketched this temple, 
eleven columns still remained ; I could only 
count seven. Five only are contiguous, and 
support an immense architrave. Chateaubriand 
gives a long description of them, only he 
deceives himself in saying that they are close to 
the sea ; his memory has evidently proved 
treacherous. It is impossible to go over Corinth 



108 



THE DORIC ORDER. 



without being struck by the size of these pillars 
above the houses of the modern town. These 
columns are the shortest that I am acquainted 
with, as, according to Chandler, who has mea- 
sured them, they have only half the height 
which they ought to have to be in proper pro- 
portion for their order. Chateaubriand seems 
to conclude that the first Doric had not the 
proportions assigned to it by Pliny and Vitruvius 
afterwards ; and he compares them with the 
Tuscan order. It would be better to say at 
once, that the pretended rules of proportion in 
the height or diameter of a column, were not 
known by the architects of antiquity. They are 
the result of after-study, as the rules of eloquence 
and of grammar were invented by rhetoricians. 
They are to art what rules given by rhetoricians 
are to eloquence, and what grammar is to lan- 
guage. It has been said that the columns of the 
temple of Corinth were covered with stucco ; 
this is true. Severity, in Grecian art, as one 
sees it here and in the other ruins of temples, is 
far removed from that of the art of imitation intro- 
duced in modern times. Including the Parthe- 
non, the Grecian edifices are to our regular 
architecture, what the poems of Homer are to 
our poetry of the nineteenth century. 

October 27.. — Departure from Corinth. We 



ACRO-CORINTHUS. 



109 



passed on our left the Aero-Corinthus, the most 
majestic acropolis in all Greece. An admirable 
instinct had taught this people to make choice 
of sites for their towns. Thus the great cities 
of Greece, Athens, Corinth, Argos, Messene, 
MycenaB, are built at the foot of mountains 
crowned by citadels, destined to become the last 
refuge of a threatened country. 

Argillaceous and barren soil ; a watercourse 
cased in clay, and changing its bed during winter. 
We see the first water-mills of the Peloponnesus. 
To construct these, they commence by turning 
the course of the river by a canal, and when it 
has run for a long time by a gentle descent 
which is raised considerably above the level of 
its natural bed, the waterfall is imprisoned in 
an enormous tunnel made of planks, which 
gently inclines, and by which the water is 
directed upon the wheel of the mill without 
losing a single drop. It is probable that this 
form of construction may be traced to very 
ancient times. We often met country people 
bound for the modern Corinth. They politely 
wished us good-morning, the kalimera that we 
exchanged with them. 

Arrived at Kortesa. We breakfasted with 
the cavalry officer. Kind M. de Saulcy pre- 
scribed and gave quinine to a young Greek 
lady of this officer's family, who had been suffer- 



110 



RUINS OF MYCENAE. 



ing from fever for a long time. We met with 
a most kind reception. At the moment of our 
departure, the young Greek gracefully offered 
to M. de Saulcy a souvenir, which he thought it 
right to accept. We passed through a dange- 
rous gorge before reaching the plain of Argos. 
We were then on the very spot where the 
waters divide between the gulfs of Argos and 
Lepanto. We followed for some distance a 
pretty rivulet, of which the banks were covered 
with magnificent oleanders 5 some were still in 
flower. It is probably the Inachus. Instead of 
crossing the plain, we took the left, and by an 
easy descent soon found ourselves at Mycenae. 

Mycenae is one of the most interesting ruins 
of Greece. There is no traveller who has not 
visited it. Thanks to the researches of Lord 
Elgin, the magnificent subterraneous manument, 
commonly known as the tomb of Agamemnon, 
is entirely cleared. 

It is difficult to determine whether this build- 
ing is a treasury or a tomb. Pausanias says : 
'i Amongst the ruins of Mycenae, are the sub- 
terranean chambers of Atreus and his sons ; it 
was in these treasuries that their riches were 
deposited. One also sees the sepulchre of 
Atreus, and of all those immolated with Aga- 
memnon by ^Egisthus." It is clearly proved by 
this passage that the treasuries were distinct 



TOMB OF ATREUS. 



Ill 



from the sepulchres ; and that the treasuries 
were subterraneous chambers. From this, should 
one not look upon this monument as the trea- 
sury of Atreus, rather than as his tomb ? I 
incline towards this opinion. The fact of deep 
holes being placed at equal distances in the 
interior of the large chamber, indicates that 
strong nails of bronze were placed there, for the 
purpose of suspending different objects. 

This monument is a circular edifice, of which 
the conical arch is formed by horizontal layers of 
stones. The entrance door is surmounted with 
a lintel of one single stone, which is not less than 
twenty-six feet and a few inches in length, above 
which is a triangular window, which some tra- 
vellers have mistaken for an ogee. This tri- 
angular opening is also formed of horizontal 
stones. I have no doubt that this monument 
has always been beneath the level of the ground 
that surrounds it, and was never above the 
level of the soil. One door, in the interior, 
leads into a little chamber, which was evidently 
the secret receptacle for some precious treasures. 
This chamber is only lighted by the very large 
door, and from above by a triangular window. 
This monument is most curious ; it is one of 
the most ancient in Greece. One knows that 
My cense was destroyed by the Argives, jealous 
of the glory that she had acquired by sending 



112 



THE GATE OF LIONS. 



forty of her bravest men to die at Thermopylae, 
with the Spartans. 

This barbarous jealousy on the part of the 
people of Greece, who could not endure the vici- 
nity of a prosperous neighbour, throws a feel- 
ing of invincible disgust over their history. 
One has a difficulty in reconciling these per- 
petual plunderings and missions with the love 
of the arts and the degree of civilisation to 
which they had raised themselves. It required 
many ages to make them comprehend that the 
homicide of a people was a crime, as much as 
the assassination of a passenger in the gorge of 
a mountain. Since Lord Elgin, another tomb, 
constructed upon the plan of that of Atreus, has 
been despoiled. We first saw it before arriving 
at the foot of the Acropolis. Chateaubriand 
has the glory of having discovered it, and of 
having pointed it out to M. Fauvel. Pausa- 
nias speaks of five celebrated tombs, constructed 
beyond the walls of Mycenae. 

We now ascended to the Acropolis. Here is 
the famous Gate of Lions, which Pausanias saw, 
and the walled enclosure, made of enormous 
blocks, raised one upon another, ruinous in his 
time, as in our own. Nothing has been moved 
for twenty-three centuries, and the bold sculpture 
of the gate of the Acropolis still shows its two 
dishonoured lions, in the same way as with us 



CYCLOPEAN WALLS. 



113 



the escutcheon of a great feudal house is seen 
over the door of a ruined dungeon. Chateau- 
briand is mistaken in saying that they are 
sculptured upon each side of the door. They 
form a bas-relief upon a triangular stone placed 
upon another enormous stone which serves as 
lintel. The lions are standing, and have their 
fore feet resting upon a pedestal supporting a 
column having mouldings both on its base and 
its capital. The entablature above the capital 
presents two flat bands, between which are 
sculptured four little globes, which are placed 
side by side like the beads in a chaplet. I 
examined minutely the whole detail of this 
curious specimen of architecture, which goes 
back to the heroic times, nearly fifteen centuries 
before our era. There is nothing which recalls 
Grecian art, even in its most remote times. 
There are some words of Pausanias which I 
look upon as very precious, because they would 
indicate an affinity between this sculpture and 
that of the Greek. After having said that the 
walls and the gate of Mycense are the works of 
the Cyclopes, who raised for Prcetus the walls 
of Tirynthus, he gives the dimensions of the 
lintel of the door (sixteen feet long), and of the 
bas-relief above (nine feet and some inches in 
height), and he adds : — - 

" These lions, or rather these lionesses, are 

i 



114 



ALLEGORICAL CARVINGS. 



without the tail belonging to their species, a 
circumstance equally found upon some sculp- 
tures at Persepolis, representing similar animals 
to those at Mycenae. The monuments at Per- 
sepolis have also pillars surmounted with bulls, 
having great analogy to the pillar surmounted 
with four bulls between the two lions. In the 
Persian religion, these bulls, it is said, repre- 
sented the sun; and it appears that the Cy- 
clopes came from Syria. Moreover, in Egypt 
one often meets with monuments having pillars 
with globes." 

So says Pausanias. This passage confirms my 
opinion upon the synchronism of the arts of 
most remote periods. 

We quitted My cense with regret. "We again 
descended into the plain, along which we were 
obliged to continue our course as far as Argos. 
We entered by a very broad street, with shops 
on each side, their whole aspect full of ani- 
mation. This is the characteristic of the little 
towns of modern Greece : there is constant 
movement and life, a sign of revival amongst 
the people, which does good to the traveller, 
because he compares their present prosperous 
state with their recent servitude. We saw the 
same activity at Nauplia, at Tripolizza, and at 
Mistra. Antonio conducted us to a wretched 
lodging. 



TIRYNTHUS. 



115 



October 28. — We were early on horseback. 
We went to see the remains of ancient Argos, 
close to which are the rains of edifices of diffe- 
rent epochs. We did not ascend to the Acro- 
polis, built at the summit of a high mountain. 
At its foot, the theatre of Argos, cut out out of 
the rock, is still entire, as if only left yesterday 
by the thousands of spectators which it could 
hold. Its dimensions are considerable, about 
450 feet in diameter. M. de Saulcy fell in with 
an antique statue recently discovered, and I 
copied the inscriptions, which are not yet pub- 
lished. 

At nine o'clock we took the road for Tiryn- 
thus. The cure of Argos came to accompany a 
corpse to the cemetery. He was preceded by 
an incense-bearer. We passed close to him. 
He carried in his hand a wooden cross, the pas- 
toral staff according to the ancient native usage. 
This cross is bent back, and exactly similar to 
the shepherd's crook of this country. I brought 
away as a souvenir one of these crooks, which T 
found in crossing the mountains of Arcadia. It 
is a beautiful and holy image, which gives the 
pastor of souls the symbol of the vigilance of 
the shepherd for his flock. 

From Argos to Nauplia a vast plain extends 
traversed by the Inachus, which at this time 
contained not a drop of water ; it terminates at 

I 2 



116 



TJRYXTHUS. 



the side of the sea by the celebrated Marsh of 
Lerna, which we had to cross the next day in all 
its length. I forgot to mention the magnificent 
cypresses of Argos. It is difficult to describe 
these majestic green obelisks, beneath the bril- 
liant sky of Greece. 

"We soon reached Tirynthus. "We breakfasted 
in the 0}3en air, at the khan opposite the old 
military school built by Capo d'Istrias. It is a 
large but now deserted building. We hastened 
to the ruins. They are as celebrated as those of 
My cense. 

Picture to yourself an immense mound, either 
natural or artificial, in the centre of the plain • 
surround it by walls composed of enormous 
blocks scarcely hewn, and you will have an idea 
of Tirynthus. We climbed this mound, and 
examined these prodigious walls, which have 
stood for so many ages. Their most remarkable 
feature is a very long gallery, formed of the 
same blocks as the rest of the rock, of which the 
arched roof is completely ogive. The windows 
are placed at regular distances. But to repre- 
sent the ogive of this arch, one must be aware 
that it is not formed in the usual manner. The 
immense blocks which compose it, are placed 
horizontally, as those of the walls are perpen- 
dicular. They are hewn so that in joining at 
the summit of the arch they form an ogival bay. 



EARLY ARCHES. 



117 



The arch is formed of four blocks, of which two 
are placed on each side. It is the most singu- 
lar specimen of architecture in all Greece. The 
middle ages, therefore, did not invent the ogee. 
In the highest part of the Acropolis, we found 
mouldings which seemed like the bases of 
columns, and which had no sort of analogy with 
those of Grecian architecture. It is evident, 
that Mycense and Tirynthus belonged to an 
epoch of civilization anterior to that with which 
history has made us acquainted, and which we 
know from the other Grecian buildings. 

Argos, Mycense, and Tirynthus, placed at 
some hours distance from each other, capitals of 
three little independent kingdoms, could not 
long remain at peace. The weakest must soon 
fall before the most powerful. 

We passed the same day a pretty agricultural 
village, constructed by the Germans who were 
brought by the king of Greece to this kingdom. 
These men had in a short time raised some 
rustic, and at the same time commodious and 
elegant dwellings. The streets of the village are 
all in straight lines. Everything breathes the 
genius of the north. 

The national jealousy has put a stop to this 
attempt at colonization which had so well suc- 
ceeded. Placed in the plain of Tirynthus, at 



118 



NAUPLIA. 



two paces from the marsh of Lerna, the Ger- 
mans would have communicated to the Greeks, 
who still practise the agriculture of Homers 
time, their patient spirit, and their love for the 
labours of the earth. But it has been neces- 
sary to yield to popular feeling. A decree of 
the legislature has forbidden any foreigner from 
establishing himself upon the soil of Greece. 
The village has been in a great measure aban- 
doned. Grass grows around the houses ; the 
Greeks have not the good feeling, after the ex- 
pulsion of these honest Germans, to come them- 
selves to continue the cultivation of this fertile 
plain. We did not hear a single human voice 
in this desolate village, which in a few years 
will be a ruin. 

We arrived in good time at Nauplia. We 
passed at the foot of the fine fortress of Pala- 
mide, which is the acropolis of Nauplia, We 
lodged at the Hotel de la Paix. 

October 29. — We passed a dreadful night. 
None of us closed our eyes. H We are here 
worse than in the infernal regions," escaped from 
me amidst the silence which reigned in the 
dormitory where we were packed, — an excla- 
mation which put my travelling companions in 
good humour, suffocated with heat and devoured 



FIRST GREEK PARLIAMENT. 



119 



as I was by insects. It was necessary, however, 
to exercise patience until daylight. We shall 
never forget the Hotel de la Paix. 

In the month of August, 1832, M. de Lamar- 
tine landed at Nauplia. This town was then 
the capital of Greece. The illustrious traveller 
remained there some time, to give a little repose 
to his beloved daughter, Julia, who breathed 
her last in the East. He has described, in his 
graceful style, a sitting of the Greek parliament. 
The hall was a mere shed ; the walls and roof 
were formed of planks of fir, badly put together-. 
The deputies were seated on benches, and spoke 
from their places. The bearing of these men 
was martial and lofty ; they spoke loudly. 
M. de Lamartine was struck with the imposing 
spectacle of this armed nation, deliberating 
under a roof of planks, hastily constructed, and 
ready to support with the sword the holy words 
inspired by patriotism. 

M. de Lamartine neither visited Mycenae nor 
Tirynthus ; he consoled himself by abusing the 
empire of Agamemnon. I cannot consent to 
forgive him for calling the recollections of this 
country, where Homers heroes reigned, "old 
historical fables." I saw with pleasure the rich 
country of Arcadia, which inspired him with 
regret ; but if I, like him, love the tree crowned 
with foliage, the spring beneath the rock, the 



120 



MARSHES OF LERNA. 



oleander on the banks of the river, I cannot 
withhold my admiration and homage from those 
sacred ruins, which have beheld the pastors of 
the people, and which were the first monuments 
erected upon the heroic soil of Greece. 

October 29. — The Gulf of Nauplia forms an 
immense horse-shoe, which which we were obliged 
to traverse, almost constantly in the water, to 
avoid the Marsh of Lerna (where we should 
have been lost in the quagmires) and a Turkish 
pavement, formed of sharp stones, upon which 
horses cannot travel. The different arms of the 
hydra of Lerna are deep waters which issue 
from the marsh, and which are fed by the 
Inachus and the other rivers that lose them- 
selves in the plains of Argos. One of the most 
celebrated labours of Hercules was to effect the 
draining of this swamp, by digging the canals 
which we crossed, and which empty themselves 
into the sea. It was a singular coincidence 
that one of the peaceable Germans who settled 
near Tirynthus, succeeded this fabulous hero, 
and recommenced his labours. 

We breakfasted at Mylos, a little village at 
the other extremity of the gulf, opposite to 
Nauplia, close to a beautiful spring of water, 
which issues limpid from the rocks. I arranged 
the plants which I bad gathered since our de- 



TRIPOLIZZA. 



121 



parture from Athens. We ascended a chain of 
mountains which separates Argolis from Ar- 
cadia. A high road was in course of construc- 
tion from Argos to Tripolizza. 

We saw the Acropolis of an unknown town, 
which we passed without visiting it. A terrible 
rain drenched us. We slept at Agiorietika 
(Saint George), in a wretched grange, sheltered 
by a few tiles. We made a large fire, and suc- 
ceeded in drying our clothes; though, during 
the night, we fully atoned for our abuse of the 
suffocating heat in our quarters at Nauplia. 



122 



SARANTA POTAMOS. 



CHAPTER VI. 

Saranta-Potamos. — Khan of Kravata. — Mount Taygetus. — 
The Eiver Eurotas. — Tomb of Leonidas. — Sparta, — Habits 
of the Greeks. — Mistra. — A Greek Election. — Talley of 
the Eurotas. — Encampment of Reapers. — Return to Lon- 
tari. — The Greek Services. — Plan of the Churches. — Sin- 
gular Bridge. — Blount Ithome. — Messene. — Fountain of 
Clepsydra. — Temple of Jnpiter. 

October 30. — We arrived early at Tripolizza, 
the ancient capital of the Morea under the Turks. 
Chateaubriand relates, in a striking manner ; his 
reception from the Pacha, as well as his adven- 
ture at three leagues from Tripolizza, with two 
young Turkish officers. 

We left Tripolizza in a pelting rain, turning 
our backs upon Menale, and following the valley 
of Tegea. After crossing some hills, we entered 
the valley of Saranta Potamos. The wide bed 
of this river, in which there was a good deal 
of water, was often our road. In many parts 
of Greece, there is no other road than those 
made by the rivers or the torrents. After a 



KHAN OF KRAVATA. 



123 



monotonous day's travel, we arrived, at night, 
at a miserable khan, called Krya-Vrysis (the 
Cold Fountain) . I pass over with regret a sin- 
gular adventure that happened to us during the 
night. Sparta is before us, and I hasten to 
relieve my readers from the weariness of this 
route. 

October 31. — This day we beheld Sparta. 
While they were loading the mules with our 
baggage, I gathered from amongst the rocks of 
Krya-Vrysis some very fine crocuses. We found 
some woods of arbutus in flower, and myrtle, in 
the bosom of the mountains which form the 
commencement of the chain of the Menelaus. 
We frequently found ourselves in the midst of 
beautiful scenery. It is no longer the barren 
nature, nor the soil, despoiled and burnt-up, of 
so many parts of Greece. This country is as 
beautiful as in the time of her splendour. The 
weather had improved ; a beautiful day, with a 
brilliant sun, had succeeded to the wearisome 
day before it. We breakfasted at the khan of 
Kravata. I swallowed a few mouthfuls in haste, 
and went out to plunge into the neighbouring 
woods, to make my most successful botanizing 
in Greece. 

We took some raki at the khan of Vourla ; 



124 



MOUNT TATGETUS. 



and commenced our descent from the moun- 
tains. 

At this moment all nature seemed embellished 
before us. While to the south the immense plain 
of Sparta, spread at our feet, seemed in a sea of 
light, while Mount Taygetus presented himself 
before us in all his magnificence, a storm was 
gathering in the distance, to the north of La- 
conia. Soon some slow and repeated reverbe- 
rations announced the commencement of the 
tempest, and it was to the sound of thunder 
that we first trod the sacred soil of Sparta. 

"When many travellers, among others Chateau- 
briand, have visited Sparta, it was only a soli- 
tude; it is now a small town. It must be said, 
to the praise of the Greeks, that they wished 
Sparta to rise from her ashes ; that they made 
her one of the chief seats of a monarchy, and 
have declared her the second city of the king- 
dom. The two chief buildings of modern Sparta 
are the barracks and the church. The church is 
a large oblong square, without style and without 
ornament. The barrack is the most sumptuous 
edifice of the town ; it has a peristyle orna- 
mented with columns. One sees here the im- 
portance attached to public force. In Greece 
there is but one man who has power, and that 
is a gendarme. He is absolute master, where- 



THE RIVER EUROTAS. 



125 



ever he is. When a citizen does not know his 
rights, it is natural that he should recognise 
that of force. The gendarme who acted as our 
escort never hesitated to strike any one who did 
not instantly obey him. At Krya-Vrysis, the 
master of the khan was roughly treated by one 
of them. Some days later, upon our arrival at 
a mill, where made our morning halt, the women 
fled into the fields ; the gendarme caught one of 
them, seized her by the arm, and compelled her 
to return to the house and make a fire, that the 
cook might prepare our repast. 

To arrive at Sparta, we had to cross the 
Eurotas, one mile below a very elevated bridge, 
constructed of one single arch, and which forms 
a striking feature in the landscape. The Eurotas 
was full of water ; the rains had rather swelled 
it, and the plain which we crossed to reach the 
plateau, and the little hills upon which Sparta is 
built, were so thoroughly saturated with wet, 
that we narrowly escaped sinking into them with 
our horses. These districts, however, as well as 
the whole plain between Sparta and Taygetus, is 
very well cultivated. 

The description of Sparta, given by Chateau- 
briand, is exact. It may be completed by 
the valuable scientific expedition to the Morea, 
which has given to the world such an admirable 
map of the town and its environs. 



126 



TOMB OF LEONID AS. 



Few of the ancient cities of Greece have pre- 
served so few of their monument s, as Sparta. 
The theatre, backed by the hill which was the 
Acropolis, is still easily recognized ; its diameter is 
immense. A little lower, I stopped at the ruins of 
a small Christian church, of a very early date. 

At Sparta the tomb of Leonidas is worthy of 
this great name. It is a simple oblong square, 
made of large blocks of quarried stone, which 
recall the walls of antiquity : that which remains 
appeals strongly to the mind. A tomb, orna- 
mented with delicate bas-reliefs, has nothing in 
common with the glory of the simple and heroic 
Spartans. 

M. de Saulcy had letters from the good 
Colonel Touret for M. Kopaniza, deputy of 
Sparta, who, in consequence of this recommenda- 
tion, eagerly pressed us to make use of a house 
belonging to him in the town. 

November t. — We could only give one day 
to Sparta, and nevertheless Taygetus rose before 
me. How could I return to France without 
having botanized upon Taygetus ? The weather 
was awful ; a fine rain fell the whole morning. 
Not with standing, I undertook the ascent of Tay- 
getus — I took upon me the airs of a Spartan. 
I could not obtain a guide, so I said that I 
would go without one. My companions repre- 



SPARTA. 



127 



sented to me the imprudence I was committing 
in ascending the mountain alone and without an 
escort, Here I was travelling the plain, through- 
out planted with magnificent olives, which sepa- 
rates Taygetus from Sparta. I soon came to 
the river which descends from Mistra, which 
was like the Eurotas, swollen by the rains. Like 
a true Lacedemonian, I crossed it without shoes 
or stockings. After an hour's walk I was at 
the foot of the chain. 

The ascent of Taygetus does not, like that of 
other great mountains, prepare you, by a long 
and gentle ascent, for what you have afterwards 
to encounter. On the Spartan side you have 
the plain to the very base of the mountain. 
There commences its first spur, an abrupt ascent, 
which you climb by a narrow serpentine road, 
that carries evident traces of its antiquity. 
Arrived upon the first platform, the group of 
rocky points and angles of which Taygetus is 
formed, rise at a little distance, resting upon this 
spur as upon a huge pedestal. The whole of 
the road which I had already ascended, was 
covered with rich vegetation. There were not 
only plants, but trees of every kind, though of 
little height, which covered the side of the 
mountain. 

I found some beautiful vines upon my reach- 
ing the plateau, at the height of more than 



128 



A RENCONTRE. 



3,280 feet above the level of the plain. A large 
monastery has recently been built at the foot of 
one of the peaks of Taygetus ; it is not yet 
occupied. I had spent four hours in this ascent, 
in constant rain. After reaching the monastery, 
I rested some moments beneath a rock; a young 
Greek, accompanied by his wife, passed by ; he 
followed the same road as myself, and was going 
further into the mountain. In passing, the 
Greek saluted me, and went a little farther off, 
beneath a more projecting rock, where I could 
not see him. A few minutes after he came to 
ask me to go where he was, as I should have 
better shelter ; I followed him, and sat under 
the sheltering rock. I made him understand, in 
a few words of classical Greek, that I was a 
botanist — he took me for a doctor : he told me 
that his child was ill ; that he came from Mistra, 
with his wife, to seek some remedies for it. I 
perceived, in fact, a long package fixed between 
two sticks, and supported by leather straps — the 
mother had placed it at her side to protect it 
from the rain. There lay the poor little creature. 
The mother unfolded the swaddling-clothes, and 
showed me her child ; I felt its pulse ; it was 
burnt up with fever. The father showed me in 
a phial, the white potion that the chemist had 
sold him ; I told him that it would do very well, 
and that it would cure the child. My words 



HABITS OF THE GREEKS. 



129 



seemed to comfort the afflicted couple. One is 
happy in giving even some hope. 

This Greek mountaineer had a fine form and 
good expression ; he was well, but not richly, 
dressed ; his wife was small, and very simply 
clad. In Greece, as in all the East, woman is 
in a state of servitude. The Greek sat close to 
me under the rock ; he never thought of his 
wife, who stood at the side of the portable cradle 
which held her child. He who had been civil 
to a stranger, and who was ready to brave the 
wet to come to invite me to take a place by him 
under shelter, had not the good feeling to give 
the best place to his wife and his child. Two 
days after, we saw what was much worse. Upon 
our route between Messene and Phigaleia, we 
met five or six Greek women laden with 
enormous faggots of wood, which they were 
carrying to the village. They seemed quite 
exhausted with their burden. During this time, 
their husbands were idle at home. All Greeks 
detest labour ; what they like is a musket. 
The out-door life, the life of a soldier — of a pali- 
kar, that is what suits them ; for in-door life 
and household cares they have the greatest 
contempt. These men, therefore, who carry a 
musket covered with rich chasing, handsome 
pistols, and always a poignard, inhabit miserable 

K 



130 ANCIENT AND MODERN GREEKS. 

houses, such as our French peasants would blush 
to live in. 

The handsome Spartan left me to continue 
his road. Chateaubriand has taken upon himself 
obstinately to assert that the modern Spartans 
are not descended from those so celebrated in 
history. He says that the Mainotes are not 
Greeks, but descendants of the barbarians who 
invaded the Peloponnesus, and took refuge in the 
mountains. Some Sclavonians may have esta- 
blished themselves in the country, but the mass 
of the nation has remained Greek. One can 
still recognize the beautiful Grecian type which 
the nation has preserved. When one is a little 
versed in ethnological studies, it is impossible 
to be deceived in characteristics so marked as 
those which separate the various human families. 
Besides, the fact of the lanoaiao-e is an unanswer- 
able argument. Greek would not be the language 
of the inhabitants of Laconia, if the national 
element had not remained dominant after e very- 
invasion. Besides, in a historical point of view, 
Constantine Porphyrogenitus is decisive upon 
this point. I cannot imagine that any one can 
hold a contrary opinion at this day, though 
Chateaubriand contends that this opinion is 
ridiculous. 

Before quitting the heights I had reached, 



VIEW OF THE MOUNTAIN. 



131 



notwithstanding a violent wind and constant 
rain, I wished to carry away a sketch of Tay- 
getus, of which the highest peaks rose before 
me. It was a happy moment for admiring 
them and drawing them. I was in shelter 
behind the ruins of an antique hut. A little 
window served as a framework to the mag- 
nificent view I was sketching. The clouds, one 
after another, covered the summits of Taygetus, 
and in disappearing, left them standing out in 
bold outline against the pale blue of a sky laden 
with vapour. The new monastery, with its white 
facade, stood upon the second plain, surrounded 
by newly-tilled soil ; I gave a last glance to this 
magnificent scene, which I should never revisit. 
I gathered a beautiful flower of the rose-cistus, 
the only one remaining of the autumnal vegeta- 
tion upon the last promontory, where I rested 
before descending again into the plain. 

1 had experienced so much enjoyment in this 
adventurous expedition, where I might, ten to 
one, have been robbed, and thrown into a ravine 
by some Mainote bandit, that I did not perceive 
that my clothes were soaked, and that the rain 
had penetrated to my skin. 1 descended, like a 
squirrel, by the same sinuous path by which I 
had made my ascent. After crossing the plain, 
I arrived at a little distance from Sparta ; but 
the rain had considerably swollen the river which 

K 2 



132 



MIST R A AND ITS PEOPLE. 



I had forded in the morning. I sought in vain 
for a place where a wider part might perhaps 
present less depth of water. I followed the 
bank of the river as far as a mill, where, with 
the help of a mule accustomed to stem this 
torrent, I gained the opposite bank. I had had 
a thorough Spartan day. 

It was four o'clock in the afternoon. Before 
dinner we set out on horseback to see Mistra. 
We arrived there in a deluge of rain. The sky- 
was so covered with clouds, that having no hopes 
of the rain ceasing, we regained the road to 
Sparta, without having seen more of Mistra 
than the high street which we had crossed. The 
place is composed of two distinct towns. The 
upper town, crowned by a castle built upon one 
of the isolated promontories of Taygetus, is 
almost deserted. The lower town is all life and 
animation. The Lacedemonians, so celebrated 
in antiquity for their skill in working in iron, 
have still the same taste. The greater part of 
the shops of the principal street in Mistra were 
blacksmiths' workshops. The whole population 
consisting of little shopmen and workmen, were 
noisy. Our party excited their lively curiosity. 
They laughed at the piteous state to which the 
rain had reduced us. 

We met at dinner an agreeable Greek, M. 
Kopaniza, one of the richest landed proprietors 



A GREEK ELECTION. 



133 



of Laconia. He was at Sparta for the elections. 
He related to us circumstances connected with 
the manner of conducting the elections in 
Greece, which appear incredible. The gend- 
armes and all the agents of public force exercise 
an external pressure upon the elections, and 
endeavour by the most violent measures to gain 
votes for the Government candidates. Sangui- 
nary scuffles are the consequence of this ; men 
of the opposition are irritated ; the partizans of 
the ministry support the gendarmes. There 
are regular combats. The pacific contest 
of the electoral urn is only accomplished after 
some shots have been fired. There cannot 
possibly be an intelligent Government with such 
a policy as this. Besides, the Greeks have 
arrived at an utter indifference for this Germanic 
royalty, which has been given them by Euro- 
pean diplomacy. The hour will come when this 
indifference will engender disgust. How many 
dynasties, destined to live for ages, have lost 
themselves in a few years ! 

Greece, at this day a very small kingdom, 
not numbering more than nine hundred and 
ninety thousand inhabitants, is called to a noble 
destiny in the future. 

Greece is the France of the east, as Poland is 
the France of the north. The Poles, the Greeks, 
and the French, have more in common than the 



134 



CURIOUS CHURCH. 



men of any other nation. We were surprised 
to hear with what facility the Greeks spoke our 
language. M. Kopaniza had in his conversa- 
tion all the liveliness of a Frenchman; and with- 
out being conscious of it, let fall many little 
idioms which are so familiar to us, but which 
we never expect to hear from the lips of a 
stranger. Nevertheless, he has never been in 
France. 

November 2. — We quitted Sparta. We left 
it by the same road by which we had entered. 
A large cippus lay prostrate, and barricaded the 
road. In going to Taygetus the day before, I 
had seen a beautiful little deserted church in the 
middle of the wood of olives. The plan of the 
building, which I had taken very carefully, is 
very curious. The lintels of the doors were 
made with the architraves of ancient buildings. 
An enormous cherry-tree had grown at the 
side of this little Christian church from a very 
remote period, and had sheltered the ruins. I 
observed a peculiarity in the construction of the 
walls, of which I was a long time in discovering 
the reason. There are some little square pipes, 
raised perpendicularly, and inserted in the 
masonry at regular distances, of which the open- 
ing commences at three feet above the pave- 
ment, and communicates above the roof. They 



VALLEY OF THE EUROTAS. 



135 



do not exceed three inches in width. I sus- 
pected that they were intended for the purpose 
of letting air into the interior of the church 
during the performance of ceremonies. 

Arrived upon the high ground near the 
theatre, Taygetus showed himself to us upon 
the west, covered with snow which had fallen 
during the night. M. Kopaniza had sent to us 
a young and handsome palikar, to do us the 
honours, and to accompany us. He was the 
most graceful military apparition that we could 
possibly have dreamt of on Spartan ground. All 
his accoutrements were splendid : his musket 
and his two pistols were ornamented with rich 
and brilliant chasing ; he carried a little car- 
tridge-box also chased with much art. M, de 
Saulcy did not wish him to accompany us far. 
In taking leave of us, he saluted us with a triple 
discharge of his musket. This was the last 
souvenir of Sparta, 

We followed the course of the Eurotas, in 
tracing it to its source. All this valley is full of 
rich vegetation. Plane-trees, myrtles, oleanders, 
are continually before us. An ancient wall, 
formed of enormous blocks of stone, appeared 
on the left bank of the river, opposite the side 
on which we were travelling. It is a remnant 
of the ancient labours of the Lacedemonians, to 
serve as a dike for the river, and to protect the 



136 



ENCAMPMENT OF REAPERS. 



plain from inundation by the overflowing of 
the water. It is probable that the other rivers 
of Greece had also quays or ditches, for the pur- 
pose of facilitating their flow, and avoiding the 
overflow upon the land, which now renders 
unhealthy so many parts of the Peloponnesus. 

Towards the middle of the day we reached 
the sources of the celebrated river, whose banks 
we had not quited. Its springs are very abun- 
dant, and issue from a little hill. They are 
sheltered by a magnificent plane-tree. Some 
antique blocks, hewn with care, he at the source, 
fragments no doubt of some sacellum raised in 
honour of the god of the river. 

Opposite to Cyparissia, where there are 
numerous domains belonging to our kind friend 
Kopaniza, we passed an encampment of reapers 
of maize, about the extremity of the plain. 
We saw then, in all their simplicity, the manners 
of the ancient Greek agriculturists. The en- 
campment was composed of huts made of 
boughs, each inhabited by one family, to which 
the corn was carried, as fast as they gathered the 
ears. After the harvest these huts are aban- 
doned, and the reapers retire to the villages, which 
we could see at a great distance. We were 
objects of great curiosity to these Greeks, to 
whom we were foreigners ; but as to them, we 
knew them : their name, their manners, the lives 



RETURN TO LONTARI. 



137 



of their fathers, had been our earliest study. They 
were unconscious of what we paid homage to, in 
their persons, of past grandeur, and noble reso- 
lutions. We reached Lontari after by far the 
longest and most fatiguing day's journey of our 
tour in the Peloponnesus. My learned friend 
declared that our expeditions were becoming too 
much for his strength. He determined that we 
should henceforward only undertake short 
journeys. The reader may believe, that for the 
sake of giving more time to my beloved plants, 
I said Amen to this decision. 

Before reaching Lontari we heard firing and 
wild cries from the side we were approaching. 
It was quite dark. "We were at the mercy of 
our horses on a steep road, in the midst of rocks. 
Had we been less numerous we might have 
been alarmed. We soon solved the enigma. 
We were about to pass a party of Greek elec- 
tors who were returning from the town, after 
recording their votes ; and who, in retiring to 
the villages, dividing into parties, were gal- 
lantly exchanging shots. We were much edi- 
fied by these electoral manners, of which M. 
Kopaniza had told us. We heard afterwards 
that he had lost his election : we had not car- 
ried him good-luck. 

November 3. — At day-break I went to visit 



138 



THE GREEK SERVICE. 



the church of Lontari. That, as well as the 
church of Daphni, is the best specimen of By- 
zantine art that I have examined in Greece. I 
made an exact plan of it. I found in the upper 
galleries some human bones. It appears that, 
according to the usage of the most remote an- 
tiquity, the Greeks withdraw from their ceme- 
teries the bones of their dead, when denuded of 
flesh, and carry them to the churches, for the 
purpose of praying over them. This respect 
for the dead is a noble feeling amongst a people. 
The Greek priests encourage this practice, which 
is a source of small fees for them. 

When I arrived at the church, the papas 
were commencing the morning service ; they 
were lighting, in different parts of the church, 
some wax-tapers. The faithful of Lontari were 
assembling for prayer, one after the other. 
The chant of the priest was slow, murmured 
rather than chanted. Nowhere, either in 
Greece or the East, do men sing as loud as 
we do. It is an usage that we owe to the bar- 
barism of our fathers. The oriental psalmody 
is sweet, low, and without effort. Their melody, 
often monotonous, recalls the low song of a 
mother when she would sing her child to sleep. 

The Agia Sophia (St. Sophia) of Lontari, is 
of very small dimensions, like all the Byzantine 
churches that I have seen. Its total length, 



PLAN OF THE CHURCHES. 139 

including the portico and the narthex, is fifty- 
nine feet, and the width twenty-two feet ; but 
every part is so skilfully disposed, that the 
edifice seems to be double its real size. This 
Christian Greek art was inherited from ancient 
art. The effect of St. Sophia at Constantinople 
is wonderful. In studying the building upon 
the spot, one is surprised that in extent and 
length its dimensions are not larger. The St. 
Sophia of Lontari is composed of an exterior 
portico supported by two columns ; one narthex, 
above which commence the galleries which ex- 
tend right and left above the aisles of the 
central nave ; above which there is a cupola, 
whose pendants are supported by four pillars ; 
then three apses at the end of the nave, and 
the aisles. It must be observed that this 
cupola is at a great elevation, as it rises from 
above the arcades of the upper gallery. In our 
Romanesque churches in France we are unac- 
quainted with this arrangement, which is beau- 
tiful. 

The pillars are remarkable from their extreme 
lightness, and by the flatness of the carvings of 
the capitals. This is evidently a reminiscence 
of ancient art ; and the capital of the Agia- 
Sophia of Lontari reminded me of the wide 
capitals of the temple of Corinth. There are 
still some fragments of mosaic in the pavement 



140 



MAVROZOUMENA. 



of the church. I had not time to sketch 
them. 

I had very great pleasure in studying this 
little building, one of the most perfect in this 
style that I had yet seen. Such edifices bear 
witness to a fine period of Christian art. 

We traversed a magnificent oak forest, and 
breakfasted at the village of Dervena. After 
having crossed the forest, we found ourselves in 
the plain of Messenia, formerly so fertile, and 
now marshy. We passed the village of Meli- 
gala, a modern name, but with all the beauty 
of the finest names of ancient times. Large 
cactuses formed the boundary of the fields of 
Meligala. They were frozen during the severe 
winter which destroyed the vines of Athens. 
Nothing now remains of them but withered 
carcases. I took for my herbarium some of the 
internal tissue of their fibres. At last, at a 
little distance, we arrived at the wretched khan 
of Mavrozoumena. Antonio was afraid that 
we might have been too comfortable in a house 
in Meligala. It is true that we were nearer to 
Messene, and that we were in a delightful 
situation, apart from the wretched cabin into 
which we were crammed. 

A beautiful green sward carpeted the earth 
round Mavrozoumena ; it was covered with 
a pretty little white narcissus, of which I amply 



SINGULAR BRIDGE. 



141 



provided myself for our herbarium. This little 
flower was a great joy to me. At this moment 
the recollection of this delightful botanizing 
revives in all its freshness. I shall never see 
again this dwarf narcissus in Greece. It was 
then in full bloom. 

"While I rob the plain without any pity, a 
violent scuffle goes on between our agoyats and 
our palikars. One of the agoyats flourishes a 
knife, and makes the first cut upon the finger of 
an honest palikar, who had been a favourite 
with us all. We arrange the affair of honour 
between these men, and bind up the wound. 

The bridge of Mavrozoumena is the most 
curious structure of the kind existing in the 
world. It is in the form of an upsilon, that is 
to say, it is formed of three points, joined to- 
gether at the confluence of the two rivers. 
You arrive at it from three sides ; from the 
side of Mavrozoumena at the east ; from Mes- 
sene on the west ; and at the north from the 
side of Dragori. I drew carefully the plan of 
this bridge ; but it has already been published 
in the great work of the scientific expedition to 
the Morea. The basements are antique, but 
the arches have been rebuilt by the Turks ; on 
the side of Messene the bridge is still entirely 
antique. There is a bay formed by a large 
lintel, of which all the stones date as far back 



142 MOUNT ITHOME. 

as the construction of the building. The scien- 
tific expedition has committed an error in sup- 
posing that the antique layers of stones of one 
of the arches indicate an ogival arch. I was 
perfectly convinced to the contrary ; they indi- 
cate exactly a semicircular arch. But the 
upper stone has been slightly detached, which 
has deceived the observer, otherwise generally 
exact, who has detailed the labours of the expe- 
dition. 

He never speaks of the inscription which I 
discovered upon this bridge. It has besides no 
other interest than that of indicating the posi- 
tion of Karistene. 

Our night in the khan of Mavrozoumena was 
dreadful. We had no sleep, and were devoured 
by insects ; a sick child cried the whole night. 
At day-break we started for Messene. We 
ascended Mount Ithome on its" northern side. 
We admired the forest of oak, of which some 
are enormous, and have never been touched by 
the hatchet. Messenia is an exquisite country : 
it has fertile plains, beautiful rivers, and moun- 
tains covered with a vigorous vegetation. Mes- 
sene is at this day still the wonder of the 
Peloponnesus. Its beautiful inclosure of quar- 
ried blocks of stone, flanked at certain intervals 
by square towers, still remain in many parts. 
On the northern side it has suffered least. 



MESSENE. 



143 



What was our astonishment to find ourselves 
face to face with those majestic towers, and 
that double entrance, of which nothing can 
equal the grandeur of construction. 

Pausanias has spoken of the enceinte of 
Messene as the most beautiful in all Greece. It 
contains, to the north and west, several little 
hills ; to the south, a grand valley, where are 
scattered the ruins of ancient buildings ; and to 
the east, Mount Ithome, of which the eastern 
slope is very abrupt, and rendered inaccessible 
the elevated walls which form the edge. Cha- 
teaubriand could not explain to his satisfaction 
how Mount Ithome was included in the enclosure 
of Messina. He was satisfied with remarking 
that the summit of Ithome was the acropolis, 
and that from thence sprang, north and south, 
the ramparts which form the enclosure, still 
visible at this day. It is true that he passed 
the foot of Ithome without observing this mag- 
nificent ruin, of which the sight would have 
caused him as much delight as surprise. As 
for us, we devoted a whole day to the city of 
Epaminondas. We examined leisurely and 
minutely the northern gate, called the gate of 
Megalopolis, by which we had arrived, and the 
square towers, of which some are still in a per- 
fect state of preservation. One sees there the 
pure and noble genius of the Greeks. Nothing 



144 



THE GREAT GATE. 



savours of effort, of eccentricity, or of research. 
The purest taste presided over these works of 
fortification, as over the embellishment of tem- 
ples. It is the same elegance in the service of 
strength ; and one knows the long resistance 
that these noble walls made to the most terrible 
people of Greece. 

When we had entered the principal gate of 
Messene, we found ourselves in a circular court 
beautifully constructed. In front is the second 
door, and the circular wall ornamented with four 
square niches. In the cornice which crowns 
that on the left, we read a Greek inscription, of 
the time of the Romans, which no doubt refers 
to the restoration of the statue placed in this 
niche ; for nothing in the monument itself indi- 
cates any restoration subsequent to its primitive 
construction. Pausanias speaks of having seen 
a Hermes, of Athenian workmanship ; that is to 
say, in a square form. 

The second door served as entrance from the 
side of the town. One of its posts has never 
moved, and upon it still rests the immense lintel 
which was placed above this door. It is a 
carved block, which measures sixteen feet and a 
few inches in length ; three feet in height, and 
rather more than three in breadth. In the 
interior of the circular court, the stones are 
smooth ; on the exterior they are rough masses, 



FOUNTAIN OF CLEPSYDRA. 



145 



like walls in general. This door and circular 
court are now decorated with verdure instead of 
battlements. Strongly rooted laurels have pe- 
netrated the large basement stairs ; the mastic 
tree hangs suspended from the niches, no longer 
occupied by their rude idols. Nature has suc- 
ceeded in adorning this magnificent enclosure 
for the traveller. I gathered some branches of 
laurel, in remembrance of Aristodemus, king of 
Messene, who fell a prey to despair, after five 
years' struggle against the Spartans. 

After paying our tribute of admiration to 
these noble remains, which had stood there for 
so many ages, we entered into the enclosure 
itself. It required nearly an hour, traversing 
woods and cultivated fields, to reach the village 
of Mavromati, the modern Messene. We break- 
fasted at a few paces from the fountain of 
Clepsydra, mentioned by Pausanias. It was 
this fountain in which Jupiter was bathed, as an 
infant, by Ithome and Neda, after he had been 
saved by the Curetes from the barbarity of 
Saturn. Each day, water from this fountain 
was carried to the temple of J upiter Ithomates. 
The temple of Jupiter has disappeared from 
Ithome with Jupiter himself, and the fables of 
his birth, which are no longer known in Greece. 
But the fountain of Clepsydra still gives out 
abundant waters. It issues from an antique 

L 



146 



TEMPLE OF JUPITER. 



wall, formed of enormous blocks, jutting out, 
ornamented with luxuriant vegetation, as with 
an eternal crown. The Christian church is at 
a few steps above the temple of Jupiter. It 
is small and magnificent. I took impressions 
very carefully of some bas-reliefs of the Christian 
era, which had belonged to a still more ancient 
church. The Greeks of Mavromati assisted me 
in the operation, bringing me the water for 
damping my paper, There were a number of 
them, talking and laughing, under the bright 
sun of the last days of autumn. The members 
of the scientific expedition to the Morea do 
justice to the hospitality which they received for 
a month from the inhabitants of Mavromati. 
" It was not without regret that we quitted this 
beautiful spot, as well as our hosts, whose gene- 
rous hospitality, and simple and innocent man- 
ners recalled the pastoral age, to which fiction 
has given the name of the golden age." 



ASCENT OF ITHOME. 



147 



CHAPTER VII. 

Ascent of Ithome. — The Recluse's Dwelling. — Dangerous 
Descent. — Fountain of Mandra.-— Dangerous Ford. — 
Apollo the Epicurean. — A Country Priest and his House- 
hold. — Valley of the Alpheus. — Castle of Lala. — Greek 
Agriculture. — The Fig and Olive. — The Native Plough. — 
Distillation of Raki. — Tripotamo.- — Temple of iEsculapius. 
— Convent of St. Laura. 

While my friends hunted after insects, I 
undertook the ascent of Ithome. It required a 
walk of two hours, by a winding and difficult 
path. It was agreed that my horse should be 
brought to the foot of the mountain, on the side 
of the gate of Messene, by which we should go 
out. The calcareous rocks of Ithome were 
covered with lichens of the brightest colours, of 
which I obtained a large quantity. I also took 
away some specimens of the crystallizations of 
the mountain, Towards the centre of Ithome, 
on the eastern slope, above Mavromati, I found 
the ruins of two little Greek temples. Repeated 
excavations had been made for discovering the 

l 2 



148 



MAGNIFICENT VIEW. 



plans of these temples. These researches evi- 
dently go back to the scientific expedition to the 
Morea. From this point the view was splendid. 
I watched the waters issuing from the fountain 
of Clepsydra, and from other parts of Ithoine, 
and which wind along the valley, like silver 
threads. I could see at one view the whole 
space enclosed between their immense walls. 
The mountains to the right and left are covered 
at this day with woods of wild olive, of laurel, 
and shrubs of luxuriant vegetation. The valley 
and the last abrupt slopes are cultivated fields. 
Such is the aspect of Messene. 

Here we are at the summit of Ithome. It is 
one of the most beautiful spots which I have 
seen in the state of Greece. My courage was 
well rewarded. The acropolis had, on the side 
of the city, a wall of defence, which I was obliged 
to get over. I found myself in the ancient 
citadel, of which I saw everywhere the founda- 
tions. On the eastern side, I had the rocky 
peaks ; and below, the plain of Steniclaros, 
watered by the Pamisus. On the highest 
summit of Ithome, I found a Greek convent 
which was dependent upon that of Yourkano. 
This last is lower down the mountain, a little 
below the gate of Messene. The convent of 
Ithome is inhabited by a solitary monk. This 
elevated summit is no doubt to be avoided 



THE RECLUSE'S DWELLING. 



149 



during the winter season. The door of the 
monastery was open ; I entered a first court 
entirely filled by herbs ; to the left lay the 
entrance into the church. This was the only 
part of the monastery that was locked. It seems 
that the good monk works in the fields, or 
watches his flock in the mountain ; it was impos- 
sible to find him. I could examine at leisure 
the different parts of the convent ; all the doors 
were open. One of the rooms had two or three 
old mats spread out upon the floor ; a hearth 
where between two stones there were still a few 
cinders and extinguished coals ; some earthern 
pots in a corner, with two or three clumsy 
spoons. I saw no other furniture. Near the 
threshold outside there were several large empty 
helices, very common in this mountain, still 
saturated with water, which had probably fur- 
nished the humble repast of the hermit. 

I regretted not being able to shake hands 
with the monk of Ithome. All the land below 
the building is very well cultivated. It is laid 
out in terraces, one above the other ; I crossed 
them in my descent. The little convent is 
pretty, and well-built ; at a distance it has a 
noble and imposing aspect, but it is in a great 
measure deserted. It is supposed to occupy the 
same site as the temple of Jupiter. On one 
side are two ancient cisterns, and to the norfch, 



150 



DANGEROUS DESCENT. 



the foundations of an edifice, propably that of 
the temple consecrated to the principal god- 
desses. 

The hours had passed quickly whilst I was 
in the midst of these sacred ruins. It was 
already late when I reached the road of Mavro- 
mati. The palikar who attended me did not 
know where to find me. My companions, after 
having visited the monastery of Vourkano, 
had set out for Mavrozoumena. The palikar 
determined to come to meet me, and he climbed 
Tthome on one side, while I descended on the 
other. At length, thanks to an honest Greek 
who gave me to understand that my guide had 
gone to meet me, I went to seek him, and at 
last we met. Night was coming on ; it was 
nesessary to hasten. I gave, however, a short 
time to the examination of the beautiful gate of 
Messene, of which the blocks have rolled away 
in great part from the top of the rock where it 
is situated. We were obliged to descend, with- 
out finding any path, all the eastern slope of 
I thorn e. I had difficulty in keeping my seat ; 
at every step, my horse trod upon quarried 
blocks of the walls of Messene, fallen from the 
top of Ithome. After having crossed many 
water -courses which issue from the flank of the 
mountain, we descended at last into the plain ; 
we found ourselves upon the banks of Pamisus. 



ATMOSPHERICAL QUERIES. 



151 



The river was full of water, and its banks very 
high. It was very dark ; and two or three 
times we narrowly escaped falling into the river. 
At length we were in safety; we had reached 
the bridge of Mavrozoumena : in a few minutes 
after I had joined my friends. 

During my visit to Ithome, a singular idea 
several times presented itself to my mind, 
Ithome is a very small mountain. Its eastern 
side is abrupt, and covered with rocks. The 
opposite side is in a great measure without 
vegetation, and exposed during many months 
to a burning heat. But from its sides and from 
a great height abundant springs rise impetuously, 
which form rivulets. From whence do these 
waters come ? Are they solely caused by the 
rains which fall upon this sharp summit ? Is it 
possible that a surface so small in extent could 
receive sufficient water from the rain to supply, 
during a whole year, the reservoirs which pro- 
duce such numerous and abundant cascades? 
Must one conclude, from the apparent impossi- 
bility which the ridge of Ithome presents to 
furnish alone the water for these reservoirs, that 
it comes from basins situated at a distance in 
other mountains ? But then they could only 
reach this height by being brought by conduits 
passing beneath the plains, and reascending the 
mountain as from a syphon. Can there be 



152 



NIGHT m THE OPEN AIR. 



other explanations of this phenomenon ? Can 
each mountain be a strongly hygrometric body, 
perpetually, and chiefly during the night, absorb- 
ing such a prodigious mass of vapour, and thus 
supplying these never-failing springs ? I tired 
myself m vain with seeking a solution for what 
I knew I had better leave to more competent 
judges. But I carefully state the phenome- 
non, which I found again later in the East ; 
for instance, on Mount Gerizim. 

The second night which we had to pass at the 
khan of Mavrozoumena was not more comfort- 
able than the preceding. I therefore enveloped 
myself in my cloak ; and alone, by starlight, I 
went to rest upon the turf where I had gathered 
my pretty narcissuses two days before. I passed 
in this manner some long hours, enjoying the 
beauty and the colour of this night, in the 
presence of a nature of which too much cannot 
be said. 

The moon had risen like a majestic queen from 
the peaks of Taygetus, which was upon my left. 
I followed her in my meditations with her 
sparkling train of stars, to the moment when I 
saw her sink towards Ithome, whose superb 
summit reared itself in the west. She invited 
me thus to repose. I glided like a spectre to 
the hearth of the khan, where some remains 
of boughs were still burning; the Greek crouched 



FOUNTAIN OF MANDRA. 



153 



up in the corner, was hoarsely murmuring some- 
thing of which I could not understand the sense ; 
overcome with fatigue, I extended myself upon 
the floor close to him, and I only awoke at 
dawn. 

November 5th. — We set out for Dragori, 
where we were to sleep. We passed a second 
time over the bridge with three branches con- 
structed over the Pamisus (now Pirnatza). 
The branch of the bridge we were to follow 
advances to the confluence of the river of Mavro- 
zoumena and the Pamisus. We walked during 
four hours along the plain of Messene, as far 
as Constantini. After that we ascended the 
mountains as high as the fountain of Mandra, 
where we breakfasted. I there gathered some 
pretty crocuses. We had now to descend the 
other side of a mountain by a horrid road. 
I proceeded on foot, and occupied myself with 
examining the soil, to search for plants. I 
stopped several times, and found myself alone 
behind the others, when all at once, in a thick 
bush, a wonderful plant of dazzling whiteness, 
with a long stalk, charmed my sight. It was a 
Galanthus which rose above the green tufts. 
My heart beat ; I set to work to gather as 
many specimens as possible of this beautiful 
flower, which differs from the known Galanthus. 



154 



DANGEROUS FORD. 



I was more than happy ; the drops stood upon 
my forehead, as if I had laboured hard to gain 
this treasure from the soil. It was in truth, a 
treasure for a botanist ; and its discovery, a real 
happiness. 

During my ecstasy, the rest of the party had 
followed the steep path, and had reached the 
ford of Borzi, which they had crossed. They 
were uneasy on my account ; this ford was dan- 
gerous : and with natural impatience, as well as 
out of kindness, they called out to me at the top 
of their voices to make haste. I had certainly 
heard some cries repeated by the echo. I had 
said to myself, These are the peasants reaping 
maize ; and I never perceived how the time was 
passing. At last, when I had fully satisfied 
myself with gathering a large quantity of this 
plant, of which I had found the only locality, 
I regained the mountain path. As soon as I 
came in sight, I was received with a shower of 
anathemas. " Ungrateful people," I exclaimed, 
"you do not know what a beautiful flower I 
bring you ! " At last, following the advice of 
Antonio, I ventured into the river, and fol- 
lowing the windings that he pointed out to me, 
I reached the other side. I had difficulty in 
obtaining pardon, even in showing them my 
precious Galanthus. After this, who would do 
service to mankind ? We soon reached Dragori ; 



TEMPLE OF BASS^E. 



155 



we liad still two hours before us. My friend 
Felicien and I went to see a pretty cascade, 
crowned with laurels and fine shrubs, which we 
found near Dragori. 

November 6th. — "We must ascend again ; but 
we have nearly reached the plateau, from the 
height of which a magnificent view is to be 
seen. We see, at one coup-d'ceil, Taygetus, 
Ithome, Cape Matapan, the plain of Messenia, 
and the sea on three sides. The Peloponnesus, 
with its capes and gulfs, is still the Morea, — the 
leaf of the mulberry- tree. We now cross a 
gorge covered with fine oaks; we visit the 
temple of Bassse, one of the wonders of Grecian 
architecture, constructed by Ichtinus, the archi- 
tect of the Parthenon. 

The scientific expedition to the Morea, whose 
plans of Messene are so valuable, gives also 
exact plans of this temple. It should be stu- 
died in that work. One must not dream even 
of being able to impress the reader with the 
effect which the Grecian temples produce upon 
one. It is impossible to describe what is felt in 
seeing these works of art, which are at the 
same time so simple and majestic, of which the 
conception at once strikes you, and of which 
the effect is so overwhelming. One is tempted 



156 



APOLLO THE EPICUREAN. 



to say : "I can tell you nothing ; go see them 
for yourself." 

This temple is at a little distance from the 
ruins of Phigaleia, which we did not visit. It 
was constructed as a memorial of a scourge 
from which the people, retired to this mountain, 
had the good fortune to escape. They dedi- 
cated it to Apollo Epikouros ; that is to say, the 
helper. A French lady, who has written a 
journal of her tour in Greece and Palestine, has 
called this temple, the temple of Apollo the 
Epicurean. 

The frieze of this building, found amongst the 
ruins, was taken to London in 1812. M. de 
Saulcy made the discovery of paintings in the 
sunk panels of the ceiling of the temple. These 
paintings represent little roses. I discovered an 
Tonic capital of a singular form. The centre of 
the volute, instead of terminating in a raised 
knob, presents a small rose deeply cut. 

The columns of the temple of Bassae are 
covered with white, dark grey, and yellow 
lichens, which give to the marble a velvety 
appearance of a beautiful tint. When this ruin, 
of which there is nothing now standing but its 
columns and their architrave, is seen in profile 
beneath a burning sun, which makes the pillars 
stand out in bold relief from the shadows they 



A COUNTRY PRIEST. 



157 



themselves cast, it is impossible to describe the 
fantastic appearance before one's eyes. We 
begin to comprehend Greece, and to love her 
still more ; and to give her, in our recollections 
of art, the place which is due to the superiority 
of genius. 

We arrived in the evening at Andrizena, a 
small modern town, in a delightful situation, on 
the other side of the mountains. 

November 7. — The next morning we had a 
walk of three hours and a half, in the mountains. 
My herbal continues to be enriched. We break- 
fasted at the Mill of Barzy, on the banks of a 
limpid stream, surrounded with luxuriant vege- 
tation. An hour afterwards we reached the 
Alpheus, which we crossed with some difficulty. 
After having climbed the opposite bank of the 
stream, we stopped, at Aspraspitia, a pretty 
village, where we passed the night. 

We were lodged at the house of the papa. 
He is a man of about five-and -thirty, with a 
fine black beard, and good honest expression of 
countenance. His house is composed of two 
rooms, all under one roof, and separated by a 
simple partition. When we arrived in the room 
which he had given up to us, one side of it was 
occupied by the maize, of which the harvest was 
just completed. The rest was covered by a 



158 



THE PRIEST'S HOUSEHOLD. 



tolerably clean carpet ; and here Antonio in- 
stalled us, and put up our camp-beds. 

The papa wore on his head a blue cap, full at 
the sides. He had a simple fustanel, like the 
Greek peasants, but perfectly clean; he wore 
white woollen gaiters ; over the fustanel he 
had a blue robe, fastened round the waist by a 
black sash. His wife was a fat Greek, who 
was suckling an enormous boy. They had only 
two children. The mother was dressed with 
cleanliness, which is rare amongst the Greek 
women. I conversed at the threshold of the 
door with the papa, while dinner was being 
prepared. He told me that his parish consisted 
of two hundred inhabitants ; and that each year 
in the spring, they were obliged to quit Aspra- 
spitia and take refuge in the mountains, to avoid 
the fevers caused by the vicinity of the Alpheus, 
and the mosquitos, which devour its inha- 
bitants. 

I complimented him upon the richness and 
beauty of the country. I did not touch upon 
any religious question with this worthy man; 
they are probably, in a great measure, unknown 
to him. He is an honest husbandman, who 
lives peaceably by the labour of his hands. 
Like the rest of the Greek clergy, his mind is 
uncultivated: what a misfortune for a Christian 
church to be in such a state of decadence ! 



THE POPULATION. 



159 



It was a fete-day in the Greek church, that 
of Saint Demetrius. It is the day when the 
Greeks commence their winter. And such a 
winter! We have had the most brilliant sun 
since we left Andrizena; the arbutus and the 
bladder-nut trees were still in flower; not a 
leaf had fallen from the trees, and we had tra- 
versed forests of the most smiling vegetation. 

A population is wanting to Greece. We 
saw, in the Peloponnesus, immense fields uncul- 
tivated, where there were growing vigorous 
plants, an index of the fertility of the soil. 

All Greek families are very numerous ; almost 
every year the women of Greece become mothers ; 
and, as in the East, they marry very young. 
But numbers of children die, and that can be 
explained. The Greeks are badly lodged, badly 
fed, and badly clothed; besides, they are as 
ignorant as savages, and are without doctors. 
From this cause proceeds the neglect of children 
in infancy, when the slightest remedy would 
preserve life. The population from this cause 
increases very slowly. The vanity of the official 
census has not been able to set it down even 
at one million. 

I could wish for Greece that she should be 
relieved of her Upper Chamber, and that the 
funds with which her Senate is endowed should 
be appropriated to the support of medical men 



160 



VALLEY OF THE ALPHEUS. 



for each noniarchy, for the service of the rural 
populations. The fevers which decimate the 
country would yield to medical treatment, com- 
bined with a better regimen and habits of clean- 
liness, prescribed by the doctors, who should be 
invested with the character of official inspectors 
of the public health. These are the duties of 
an intelligent policy. When a people who have 
freedom of debate in their national assembly, 
cannot ask for such institutions, they have no 
wish to take a prominent place amongst the 
nations of the civilized world. They merely 
laugh at the volubility of their orators, and tell 
them to cure their fever-patients. 

November 8.— We descended from Aspra- 
spitia into an extremely fertile valley, watered 
by a river, which often changes its bed, and 
frequently overflows its banks: it is still the 
Alpheus. We often met with aged plane-trees 
of an immense diameter, which the hatchet of 
the poor Greeks had not succeeded in felling. 
We frequently saw the manner in which trees 
are felled in the Peloponnesus; they collect 
together a quantity of wood at the foot of the 
tree, set fire to it, and when it is calcined it 
falls by its own weight. 

We had throughout the day the sight of 
most luxuriant vegetation in the basin of the 



CASTLE OF LALA. 



161 



Alpheus, and in that of the two rivers which 
empty themselves into it, and which we crossed. 

We were to sleep at Lala, on leaving the fer- 
tile valleys of the Alpheus, of Erymanthus, and 
of Ladon. "We climbed the heights whilst tra- 
versing the pine forests, which are as fine as 
those of Lebanon, interspersed here and there 
with thickets of arbutus and other shrubs, which 
were still green. The view was magnificent 
from the summit of these mountains. The eye 
could follow to its mouth the sinuous course of 
the Alpheus, which passes close to the ruins of 
Olympia. We had left them on our left. 

Lala, placed upon the mountains, occupies an 
immense and most fertile plateau. It is said to 
be the most healthy part of the Peloponnesus. 
There the air is always pure. It was at Lala 
that the first combat took place in the Greek 
insurrection. The castle where the Turks had 
entrenched themselves is nothing more than a 
ruin, which I visited in all its details. There is 
nothing of the antique about it. Lala is no 
more than a hamlet with five or six isolated 
houses. Lala and its neighbourhood ought to 
have an agricultural population of 20,000 
souls. 

Chateaubriand, during his tour, dreamt he 
was king of Greece. At Lala, I dreamt of a 
fine European colony which should come to bring 

M 



162 



GREEK AGRICULTURE. 



industry, and to mingle its blood with that of 
the noble Greeks, unhappily so little inclined to 
the labours of the field. 

Agriculture in Greece is entirely neglected. 
Wherever nature is prodigal man becomes indo- 
lent. What are his wants in these soft climates ? 
His daily cake, and a shelter for the night. 
That supplied, he asks no more. The future does 
not trouble him. The words of the Gospel : 
" Sufficit diei malitia sua," is the practical maxim 
of Eastern populations. They wait in peace for 
the morrow. 

When I beheld, for the first time, the plains 
of Athens, stripped of vegetation, dried up, and 
hardened like public squares trodden by the foot 
of passengers, I uttered hearty maledictions 
against the poor Greeks. The nakedness of the 
ground, the furrows scarcely visible, the careless 
division of estates, which gives to these rich 
countries the appearance of our most sterile 
commons, grated upon my mind every hour. I 
was to find all this, and worse if possible, in 
Syria and Palestine. 

Later, a closer study of the country mode- 
rated the severity of my first judgment. 

On one side the population is small, and the 
soil excessively fertile. The vine, when they 
trouble themselves to plant it, bears magnificent 
grapes. I eat some that were delicious at Syra 



THE FIG AND OLIVE. 



163 



and Athens. The wine produced from them is 
of an superior quality ; unfortunately they spoil 
it, like the ancient Greeks, by the resin which 
they infuse into the tubs at the moment of 
fermentation. 

The olive is found everywhere, and the fig- 
tree is in its own country. I have already 
related, that on the second day of our journey 
in the Peloponnesus, after having quitted Megara, 
we breakfasted and slept under a fig-tree, which 
had the noble proportions of our finest oaks. A 
small population, scattered over this fertile soil, 
cultivates only such a portion of the land as will 
suffice for the year's provision. From this cause 
many of the plains are neglected. 

Besides this, since the mountains, in Attica 
especially, have been deprived of their forests, 
the waters are no longer retained upon the 
heights. When the rains come, they merely 
flow down the steep flanks, tracked by ravines, 
and rush impetuously into the hollows • each 
year carrying away the earth which they have 
softened ; and then it is heaped up in beds 
which raise the lower levels ; this causes a dis- 
turbance in the provident laws of nature. The 
softened earth imbibes the torrents, and arrests 
their progress ; and there is no strong vegetation 
there to render the inundated countries healthy. 

M 2 



164 PREVALENCE OF FEVERS. 



Soon, deadly exhalations, caused by the action of 
a burning sun, render it impossible to pursue 
agricultural labours in the most fertile plains ; 
no one can venture there for a few hours, during 
the day, without carrying away the germ of 
fevers which never spare their prey. 

I was surprised to see frequently in the Pelo- 
ponnesus mountains with very arid soil, tilled 
notwithstanding with infinite pains. This is be- 
cause man is here beyond the reach of pernicious 
fevers, which often decimate the populations of 
the plains. 

On the other hand, we must not judge of the 
agriculture of these countries by our own view. 
When we see the little ploughs of the Greeks, 
which scarcely raise two inches of earth, Ave are 
tempted to say: " What a pity our good ploughs 
are not here to plough the land thoroughly ! 
It would be an error to use them, and also lost 
labour. In hot climates it is not necessary to 
turn up the earth to render it fertile. There is 
too much to be feared from the heat. Far from 
dividing it, and raising the lower beds, it must 
be left at its natural level. Provided that the 
seed that is sown can germinate in its first 
development, it wants no more • it requires a 
hardened soil, that the fibres of the root may 
penetrate the beds of earth still fresh from the 



THE NATIVE PLOUGH. 



165 



want of labour. There is an old routine amongst 
a people which is often great wisdom, because it 
is the fruit of experience. 

Our husbandry would in Greece only render 
the most fertile land a heap of cinders. Plants 
would grow rapidly, but they would soon be 
withered beneath a burning temperature, and 
the wind would scatter the soil like a sandy 
desert. 

It is probable that the plough of the modern 
Greeks has never undergone any change, and 
that it is still the ancient plough. I have exa- 
mined it with attention, and I have sketched it 
several times in Attica and in the Peloponnesus, 
and in comparing these drawings with those 
which I made afterwards of the plough in 
Palestine, I could scarcely find any difference. 
It is primitive simplicity, not to say primitive 
rudeness. 

They take good care not to plough the ground 
until seed-time. They wait till the heats are 
quite over, and it is only in November that 
labour is begun. We found this when we 
quitted Athens for our tour in the Peloponnesus. 
There was not a furrow in the plain which sur- 
rounds the town ; but, on our return, labour 
was commencing. I remember that the ancient 
soil, which separates the Areopagus from the 
Pnyx, and from the prison of Socrates, at this 



166 



THE BUCOLICS. 



day, outside the modern town, was newly 
ploughed. I searched among the furrows, com- 
posed of fragments without number, hoping to 
find something as a souvenir. However, the 
rains, which had flooded the field, had carried 
away the earth, and in some places the ground 
was as bare as a rock. 

After this golden dream of the pacific conquest 
of Greece, and of the East, by agricultural 
colonies, I take up the thread of our history. 
We were in the central plain, on the borders 
of Elis and Arcadia. All the interior of the 
Peloponnesus is fall of the most fertile vegeta- 
tion. One easily comprehends why the poets 
have placed happiness among the shepherds of 
these smiling hills. I wished to carry away 
a souvenir of the regions which have been 
immortalized in the Bucolics. I picked up a 
crook with a bent hook, perhaps lost upon the 
road by some shepherd. I keep this peaceful 
sceptre for my walks in old age. My memory, 
then, free from so many things which I shall 
know to have been but vanity, will bring back 
the beautiful verses which charmed my youth. 
I shall, in my imagination, reunite my travelling 
recollections with those of my old poets, that 
their sweet images may come to charm my last 
days. 



DISTILLATION OF RAKI. 



167 



November 9. — We must mount a gorge in the 
mountains, to reach the splendid plateau which 
commands that of Lai a, We now enter a vast 
and magnificent oak forest, which yields the 
palm in nothing to our finest forests. Our 
entomologists find here some rare insects ; they, 
in their turn, become enamoured of their booty, 
and let the hours slip by. Besides a few lichens 
on the wormeaten trunks of old trees, I discover 
nothing for the herbarium. My friends, more 
fortunate than I, plunge here and there into the 
forest ; it becomes, literally, an entomological 
frenzy. In a little while we are separated. 
At last all regain, as best they can, the beaten 
track, and we find ourselves at the khan, where 
our anxious people had prepared the morning 
repast. 

Close to this khan the mountain Greeks have 
established their manufactories for distilling 
raki. These distilleries are not expensive in 
their establishment. Everthing is done in the 
open air. They choose a stream of water^ how- 
ever small it may be, on the declivity of a hill. 
They receive this water in a basin lined with 
clay, beneath which, previously, they have 
built two supports, destined to hold a copper. 
This copper has a lid terminated sideways by a 
tube which crosses the basin of cold water, and 
serves to receive and condense the vapour of the 



163 



METHOD OF DISTILLATION. 



liquor to be distilled. After this preparation, 
they fill up the copper with the grounds of the 
raisins that are scraped out of the tubs. They 
burn, in a kind of oven under the copper, 
branches of trees picked up here and there in 
the forest ; and they collect in leather bottles 
the alcoholic liquid produced by the distillation. 
Infusions of aromatic plants, of aniseed espe- 
cially, perfume this liquor, of which the use is 
universal in the East. The Mussulman, who 
may never drink wine, drinks raki at every hour 
of the day. For them it is not wine. This 
liquor, which is less intoxicating than brandy, is 
delicate and strengthening. It is generally 
mixed with two-thirds of water : it becomes 
white by the mixture, and is not as dangerous 
as the heady wines of Eastern countries. Coffee, 
raki, and the chibouk, are the eternal passe- 
temps upon the divans of the houses, and in the 
khans in travelling. One can understand that 
with this liquor, people may easily do without 
wine. It very much resembles our anisette, of 
which it has a little of the flavour ; but there is 
no sugar in raki. 

The water which has been used for the first 
operation, is brought down to another copper, 
and so on to the bottom of the hill. 

While waiting for our entomologists, I had 
time to study these very simple distilleries. 



TRIPOTAMO. 



169 



The most delicate raid which I have drunk, is 
that of Beyrout. It is probable that the Greeks 
borrowed the art of distillation from the Phoe- 
nicians. 

We arrived at Tripotamo towards sunset. 
We had been shut in by the gorges of the 
mountains, and we had passed along dreadful 
roads in skirting the Erymanthus, which de- 
scends from the mountains with the noise of a 
torrent. Tripotamo is built near to the ancient 
Psophis, whose ruinous walls, flanked by towers 
which rise in stages on the other side of the 
mountain, we passed next day. 

Felicien de Saulcy is seized with an attack 
of fever. He is the youngest of the party ; and 
the rains which we have been able to endure, 
and the sudden transitions of temperature, from 
a burning sun at mid-day, to the chills of the 
evening, have attacked his delicate frame. 

In spite of the reiterated advice of his 
father, in spite of the counsels which my friend- 
ship had not spared him, he had obstinately 
persisted in being lightly clad. In the evening 
when we began to feel the atmosphere grow 
cool, we covered ourselves with our cloaks. I, 
without hesitation, went so far as actually to 
muffle myself in my dressing-gown. Felix, like 
a disdainful Parisian, would not unfold his 
cloak. M. de Saulcy was deeply pained to see 



170 



TEMPLE OF ^SCULAPIUS. 



his son seized with fever at the outset of the 
journey. With that readiness of thought which 
characterizes him, he decided immediately upon 
returning to Athens by the shortest route. In- 
stead of traversing, according to our original 
plan of route, over the whole north of the Pelo- 
ponnesus, it was agreed that we should pro- 
ceed direct to Vostitza, where we should embark 
for the isthmus ; and that after crossing it, we 
should take a small vessel which would convey 
us to the Piraeus. The guides and horses should 
return by the land route. We were at only two 
days' journey from Yostitza. 

November 10. — While our baggage was pre- 
paring, I went to visit the convent of Tripotamo. 
It is built near the temple of ^Esculapius, and 
in great measure with its materials. A single 
monk inhabits this convent. He was a vigor- 
ous man, with a handsome beard, who received 
me with perfect courtesy. The convent had 
suffered much in the War of Independence ; it 
has been in great part repaired. The church, 
constructed of the ruins of the temple, presents 
a rather fine cupola. My companions rejoined 
me. We reascended the course of the Eryman- 
thus, which we never left till we reached its 
source. We breakfasted in the open air, at a 
village half-way up the mountain, where there 



MOUNT ERYMANTHUS. 



171 



were a good many inhabitants. We climbed 
another ascent : the path was narrow. These 
are dangerous places, on account of the ravines 
which cross the road. I remained behind to 
gather the beautiful autumn flowers, and I found 
the ascent so dangerous, that I proceeded on 
foot along this rude path as far as the crest of 
the mountain. 

Here we were at the parting of the waters. 
This chain of mountains is called Mount Ery- 
manthus. The river which descends from it to 
the south, and which we had constantly fol- 
lowed from its junction with the Alpheus, has 
also the same name, as well as that of the 
Ladon, which traverses the same mountains, 
and goes to carry its waters to the Ionian Sea. 
At the northern side rivers rise which flow in 
the opposite direction, and lose themselves in 
the gulf of Lepanto. 

The descent was most frightfully steep, and 
by a wretched road. At length we reached the 
plain. It is the valley of Kalavrita. The land 
is low, and we had often dangerous sloughs to 
cross. The bridges were broken. The herbarium 
narrowly escaped being left in a deep ditch with 
the mule that carried it. We were at last 
relieved from these low lands, where the horses 
might have been lost at any moment. We took 
the directions of the hills: at our right we 



172 



CONVENT OF ST. LAURA. 



saw the handsome convent of Agia Lavra 
(St. Laura), where in 1822, the signal of the 
Greek insurrection was given. "We met a young 
monk of fifteen or sixteen years old, who was 
on his way to the convent. 

The cold is now very sensibly felt. 



KALAVRITA. 



173 



CHAPTEK VIII. 

Kalavrita. — Megaspilon. — Monachism in the East. — Igno- 
rance of the Monks. — Monastic Prejudices. — Decay of 
the Monks' influence. — Fertility of the Valley. — Turkish 
Habits.— Want of Bridges.— Gulf of Lepanto.— " Le 
Prophete Elie." — A Storm in the Gulf. — Our Alarm — 
Loutraki. — Salamis and JEgina. — Clerical Influence. — ■ 
Necessity of Union. — State of the Greek Church. 

November 11. — "We found a tolerably good 
resting-place at Kalavrita. During the night, 
the snow fell upon Erymanthus ; our horses' 
hoofs broke the ice upon the road when we set 
out in the morning. In a few hours I expected 
to gather the flowers of the myrtle at the foot of 
the mountains of Megaspilon, close to the sea. 
"We passed beneath the feudal castle of Kalavrita, 
perched like an eagle's nest on the summit of a 
steep rock, which crowns an inaccessible hill. 
In the middle ages there was a baron or lord 
of Kalavrita. We followed the valley, which 
becomes narrower as you approach Megas- 
pilon. 



174 



ROCK-FORMATIONS. 



The masses of rocks which form the moun- 
tains from Kalavrita as far as the Gulf of 
Lepanto, are immense beds of pudding-stone. 
Some of these beds are from thirty to fifty feet 
thick ; the rocks are very compact. To burst 
some blocks that greatly obstructed the road it 
has been necessary to blast them with gun- 
powder. Blocks of irregular shape have become 
detached from the mountains. The river which 
we had followed from Kalavrita appears at 
one of the points of elevation of the stratum. 
The lower beds are much inclined ; the upper 
ones are much less so. At the convent of 
Megaspilom which is at the back of these enor- 
mous masses, the beds are almost horizontal. 
These mountains of pudding-stone are 2,000 
feet in height, without any mixture of rocks of 
a different nature. At the southern side of 
Erymanthus I observed considerable blocks of 
the same pudding-stone ; but I had not seen 
such an interesting example of the rupture of 
the beds as that which I examined in descend- 
ing from Kalavrita. There are in diameter 
18,000 feet of mountains formed solely of these 
beds. I am ignorant whether any geologist 
has described them. These mountains are no- 
thing but one succession of immense deposits 
of rolled pebbles reunited by a calcareous 
cement. 



MEGASPILON. 



175 



Here we are in sight of Megaspilon; it 
occupies the back of one of the spurs of the 
Erymanthus. It is the most celebrated of the 
convents of the Peloponnesus. It contains, it 
is said, six hundred monks. Nature has ren- 
dered this monastery impregnable ; it is a real 
citadel, hanging on the side of a rocky peak. 
The monks have some cannon, which they used 
against the Turks in the War of Independence. 
Besides the revenues which the convent is au- 
thorized to receive by the civil law, it also 
cultivates largely, on the plain, the trees which 
produce the well-known currants of Corinth. 
Every year they export largely to the rest 
of Europe. Megaspilon is in consequence very 
rich. We saw several of the monks pass by ; 
one very young and well dressed, others with 
dirty robes and caps. I sketched their cos- 
tume at a khan, where we took some raki, 
before descending the mountains. 

I found there a young monk with a gentle 
and open air. He was a handsome Greek of 
thirty years old. The poor people called him 
papa, and were upon very familiar terms with 
him, laughing, and clapping him on the shoul- 
der. He appeared to enjoy their company very 
much; which, however, apart from this license, 
was not wanting in respect towards him. He 
perceived, when he saw me drawing in my 



176 



MONACHISM IN THE EAST. 



album, that lie was the object of my curiosity. 
He approached, and sat to me with great good 
humour. When my sketch was finished, he 
asked me for my pencil, and wrote his name, 
Abraham, in running Greek letters, on a page 
of my album. He had a very long beard, and 
long neglected hair, floating in curls beneath 
his cap. His blue robe was exceedingly dirty ; 
his legs were bare, but he wore shoes. 

I saw several of these monks at Vostitza. 
They had in general a pleasant expression of 
countenance, indicative of a soul at peace ; but 
their bearing is devoid of dignity. I compared 
them to tall youths still clothed in the blouse, 
as with us our boys are when growing up to 
manhood. At first sight you might take them 
for those men with wan faces who wander in 
the courts of lunatic asylums. There is some- 
thing in common between the child, the fool, 
and the monk. One knows nothing, retaining 
his native innocence ; the other has forgotten 
everything ; and the last has been secluded 
that he may learn nothing. The ignorance of 
monks in Greece, and in general throughout 
the East, is incredible. The superior of a 
convent in one of the islands of the Archi- 
pelago boasted to M. de Choiseul that he did 
not know how to read. 

"We are generally deceived in Europe by the 



ITS INSTITUTION. 177 

glorious recollections of the first ages of the 
monastic institutions. When souls strongly 
impressed, like Paul and Anthony, quitted the 
world for the desert ; when geniuses of the 
stamp of St. Jerome retired into solitude, and 
aspired, far from the seductions of the times, to 
a life of nearness to God, the monk was the 
ideal of the Christian : he was the living 
model of what the Gospel might realize of 
absorption of self, and of separation from things 
below. The monk was admired and envied. 
Monasteries were peopled by saints. From 
thence bishops and doctors were drawn ; and 
the happiness of the great ones of the earth was 
to have a part in the prayers of these wonderful 
men, who had habitual communion with the 
Lord. Now there is nothing of all this. In 
the numerous monasteries of Greece and of the 
East, there are few instances of men who have 
gone there in consequence of the disenchant- 
ments of life, the sorrows of the heart, and the 
crushed hopes of ambition or of genius. Nearly 
all the monks at this time, are young peasants 
sent by their families to the cloister, when their 
brothers were destined one to be a sailor, 
another an artisan, and another a labourer. It 
is rare for any one to become a monk after 
twenty years of age. Monks are received in 
the monasteries at six years old. It is a pro- 

N 



178 IGNORANCE OF THE MONKS. 



fession,' — it is bread. When travellers have 
asked these simple-minded men why they have 
left the world, they have not understood this 
profound question. They only know that in the 
world they should have had more labour, that 
bread would not be a certainty, and that a 
family would be a great embarrassment. In a 
convent there is little labour, neither bread nor 
clothing are ever wanting ; they accustom them- 
selves to celibacy. This is why they are not in 
the world. 

Without expecting of monasteries at this day 
the virtues of the heroic age of their institu- 
tion, we have a right to look for knowledge 
from them . With us, at the decline of the 
religious orders, their valuable labours in his- 
torical researches made the glory of these 
bodies. In the East, libraries are now the 
receptacles of dust, into which no monk dares 
venture. As they only understand the vulgar 
tongue, these precious manuscripts, bequeathed 
by former ages as a memorial of learning, moul- 
der before their eyes, without one curious eye 
having examined their pages. It is evident 
that the most contracted ideas, barren thoughts, 
and sameness of existence, constitute the per- 
manent state of their minds, thus deprived of 
the twofold aliment of learning and of social 
activity. Thus the monastic system, for some 



THEIR SIMPLE MANNERS. 



179 



centuries, has been barren. Neither apostle, nor 
poet, nor savant, nor artist, leaves the cloister, 
which takes a man from his cradle to put him to 
sleep, and keep him as a child till his death. 
For the grand mission of the apostolate, for the 
brilliant conceptions of poetry, for the dis- 
coveries of science and the development of art, 
it is needful that the soul should have breathed 
largely the air of liberty. Solitude after in- 
fancy is fatal. It is to put a human being 
alive into a tomb. 

I need hardly say, that in these general 
reflections, I have left on one side the excep- 
tions. I am far from not admitting them. 
There are good and gentle natures which, in all 
vocations, reflect honour upon humanity by their 
generosity, their devotion, and their noble 
instincts. The peaceful life of the cloister 
allows of the development in them of these 
precious qualities. The Christian spirit has 
come to throw a charm over these happy dis- 
positions. Such are those good men, those 
humble and resigned monks, whom one some- 
times meets with in travels to the East. We 
have here spoken of the institutions, of their 
present value, and of their social power. God 
breathes his spirit everywhere of grace and of 
peace. The child condemned to the cloister 
may become a saint. I do not wish to deny 

N 2 



180 



MONASTIC PREJUDICES. 



this. But the individual virtue of some men, 
their acknowledged merit, cannot sanction in- 
stitutions of which all the glory is in the past, 
and which now produce only by exception works 
fruitful in holiness. 

When I traversed the desert shores of Syria 
and of Palestine, the flanks of the hills in face 
of that roaring sea — image of Europe with 
its agitated civilization, at the distance of a 
thousand leagues, — showed me those empty 
cities of the dead which afterwards became the 
peaceful retreat of the solitaries of the East. 
I asked myself why souls amongst us, weary of 
the world, did not come to people again these 
solitudes; why, from time to time, some An- 
thonies, Pauls, and Jeromes, did not bid a last 
adieu to the vanities of the age ; and as bold 
fugitives, did not throw themselves into the first 
vessel, exclaiming: "You shall land me upon 
the shore, in front of Carmel." 

Then monachism would be restored ; and the 
world, always just towards that which it has not 
the courage to imitate, would have for the 
monk due admiration and homage. 

The obstacle to everything in Greece and the 
East, is the monk. There, worldly prejudices, 
antipathies of race and religious hatred, have 
their eternal asylum. The great question of 
the reunion of the separated communions with 



DECAY OF THEIR POWER. 



181 



Rome, for which the bishops and the secular 
priests have no decided repugnance, and of w T hich 
they speak as of an advantageous measure for 
the whole of Christendom, has no more intract- 
able opponents than these men of the convents. 
There is amongst them more than the tenacity 
of schism, there is the fanaticism of hatred. 
History is there to tell us with what facility, 
for such an epoch, the union of the Oriental 
churches was accomplished at the council of 
Florence. The first who murmured, who accused 
the Greek Fathers of having been cowardly in 
face of the Latins, and of having made too many 
concessions, were the monks. They agitated 
well, and used so skilfully their influence (which 
was then immense) upon the masses, that they 
were not slow to violate that unity which, later, 
at the time of the terrible separations of Pro- 
testantism, would have lent such great strength 
to the church. 

In Greece, at this time, the power of the 
monks is becoming feeble. It is an ancient 
usage preserved in the country, to which men 
conform. Families find in it an easy method of 
providing for some child; but in the movement 
of the social renovation of Greece, a movement 
little felt as yet, and which the reunion of the 
Greek Church with Rome would so powerfully 
assist, the monastic element is counted as 



182 



MEGASPILON. 



nothing. The monks were patriots : they fought 
for the independence of their country. They 
are loved for virtues which belong more to the 
soldier than to the man of prayer. As to their 
religious importance, as it does not reveal itself 
by any benefit, it is recognized by no one; it is 
an institution that has had its day; the monk 
is dying. 

I made these reflections before Megaspilon. 
We were stopped by a beautiful spring which 
issues at the foot of an enormous plane-tree. 
We measured its hollow trunk; it was 33 feet 
in circumference. The interior of this tree, 
which has existed for centuries, serves as a 
closet for the Greek women, when they come to 
wash their linen at this spring. Vostitza pos- 
sesses a plane-tree still larger in size than this 
one. We passed it at the moment of our em- 
barkation. 

From the fountain where we had breakfasted, 
before Megaspilon, that great hive of monks, 
we descended directly to the sea. The tempe- 
rature was mild ; we had a bright sun, smiling 
vegetation, and all those varied spectacles, given 
by lofty mountains, whose forms, rocks, and 
vegetation have nothing in common with those 
which we were already acquainted with. The 
view of the Gulf of Lepanto from the top of 
these mountains is splendid. Nothing can con- 



FERTILITY OF THE VALLEY. 183 

vey an idea of the intensity of the tints spread 
over the crowded summits of Helicon and Par- 
nassus, which encircle the Gulf as with a frame, 
and are lost in the extreme distance. M. de 
Saulcy, who does not like poets, and who is, 
nevertheless, a poet by nature, gave utterance in 
glowing words to the impressions of his soul in 
sight of that enchanting nature. 

We defiled into the plain by a fertile but 
uncultivated valley. We found ourselves in a 
literal forest of oleanders and other fine shrubs, 
watered by a river which we had seen for some 
time at our feet. We coasted the sea, and at 
every moment magnificent vineyards appeared 
before us. There is here a wonderful fertility 
and perpetual spring. The hedges by the road- 
side are composed of the broad-leaved myrtle ; 
a few sprigs were in flower. Before reaching 
Yostitza, we passed a bridge with four or five 
arches, beneath which there was not a drop of 
water. The river, parallel to that of which I 
have been speaking, has changed its course, after 
having forced down the detritus of conglomerate 
rocks of which it has despoiled the mountain : it 
has left its primitive bed, of which the level is 
thereby considerably raised, and is thrown to 
the east, where it forms two or three branches. 
One is obliged to cross it by a ford. In general 
at this day, in the East as in Greece, wherever 



/ 



184 TURKISH HABITS. 

the Turkish domination has extended, one has 
the sight of the abandonment of all reasonable 
regard for footpaths, roads, and bridges over 
rivers. These people have retained their bar- 
barism to our times. Civilization does not suit 
them. They often remind me of the child that 
likes to jump in the road, and who drives the 
mother to despair, vainly endeavouring to make 
it walk before her. Everything betrays this 
savage instinct in the Turk. I was alone 
one day, at Nahr-el-Kelb, at the foot of Le- 
banon ; I was taking my morning repast, before 
continuing my botanizing in the mountain, 
when I heard a mounted party making a 
very noisy descent by the road cut in this 
narrow gorge. It was the Pacha, surrounded 
by a numerous suite of officers and soldiers. 
They all wore the European military cos- 
tume ; the frock coat, the trowsers, and the 
boots. The river before the khan was very 
broad and rather deep. The only bridge in any- 
thing like repair which is to be found in all 
Syria, was scarcely 700 feet above the khan. 
It was necessary to reascend so much of the river 
to cross the bridge and continue the route. But 
the Turks took good care not to adojDt such a 
simple plan ; they mounted their horses ; and 
the Pacha at their head plunged into the river, 
crossed it with his party, and continued his road. 



WANT OF BRIDGES. 



185 



Such men as these require only the life of the 
immense steppes of the north of Asia. I saw 
the Seraskier of Damascus arriving at Beyrouth 
and having his tents pitched upon the public 
square, and passing there several days in all the 
luxury of Oriental state, rather than accept the 
hospitality of the Pacha, or take up his quarters 
in one of the hotels of the town. 

Nothing was so painful to me in our travels, 
as seeing the poor foot-passengers, men and 
women, arriving at the banks of rivers, obliged 
to strip themselves to above the waist, holding 
their clothes in a bundle above their heads, and 
risking their lives in the midst of a torrent. I 
felt great pity for old women and children in 
these dangerous crossings. We ourselves, with 
our horses, were sometimes obliged to reascend 
the rivers in search of fords. In some seasons, 
when the rivers are much swollen by the flood, 
it is necessary to retrace one's steps. Such is 
civilization in the immense Ottoman empire. 
But, by a laughable compensation, each Sultan 
has the vanity to build himself a palace which 
is washed by the waters of the Bosphorus. 
Who knows for whom, before long, these 
gorgeous constructions will be built ? 

November 12. — Vostitza, where we arrived 
at the foot of the mountains, is a little Greek 



186 



THE GULP OF LEPANTO. 



town, without associations of the past. It is 
the chief station of a nomarchie. 

It is in a very fertile plain. The fine dried 
currants are especially cultivated there. The 
town is better built than many others in Greece; 
it has also an air of ease and distinction which 
admits of comparison with some of our little 
sous-prefectures in the provinces. 

Vostitza possesses a church recently built, 
which attests the religious zeal of its inhabi- 
tants. It is situated in a large square, become, 
when I visited it, a place d'armes. Some small 
cannon had been sent with troops to protect the 
elections. This species of state of siege amused 
me very much ; it is true that the Greek soldiers 
are well disposed. The artillerymen walked 
about the town ; meanwhile a little child guarded 
the guns, seated upon a gun-carriage. After a 
long walk in the same quarter, I saw again 
this sentinel of ten years old, who was playing 
by the deserted battery. There is, nevertheless, 
a minister of war at Athens. 

The weather was tolerably fine at Vostitza ; 
but the sea was boisterous. The Gulf of Le- 
panto, majestically enframed by its mountains, 
of undulating and graceful outline, was pre- 
paring itself for the horrors of a tempest. Re- 
splendent and foaming furrows shone like large 
snow-flakes upon a black and reddish ground, 



"le prophete elie." 



187 



which was sad to behold. I went to walk alone 
some time upon the shore, where masses of 
pebbles are still heaped up, similar to those 
which I had examined in the thick beds of the 
rocks of the Erymanthus. I calculated the 
succession of geological epochs which had in 
turn left these immense deposits, and the ages 
which had passed away during which they had 
been worn down by the sea. 

M. de Saulcy, in the mean time, had enquired 
for a vessel, but the master of the boat at first 
refused to keep to his engagement, alarmed, 
perhaps, by the threatening state of the gulf. 
After a great deal of discussion, we found 
another boat. There we were huddled up, pell- 
mell, in a frail bark, where we had difficulty in 
stowing ourselves with our baggage. It was 
the " Prophete Elie." We had scarcely gained 
the open sea, when a sudden squall broke our 
bowsprit, which fell upon a large and threatening 
wave, carrying away the sail. Our sailors did 
not appear much disconcerted ; at least, their 
bronzed and impassible features did not betray 
any fear. We might regret, however, exposing 
ourselves in this manner. It is true that we 
were in haste to convey our young friend to 
Athens ; but one day of repose at Vostitza, in 
such a soft climate near the sea, could not but 
be salutary to him, after the fatigues of our 



183 



A STORM IN THE GULP. 



long journeys in the Peloponnesus. But we 
were accustomed to this kind of thing. I will 
not venture to say that there had not been a 
little bravado, and that we wished to show 
these Greeks that Frenchmen never draw back. 
We afterwards discovered that we had been 
guilty of dreadful imprudence ; that if the other 
mast had been broken, we should have been 
clashed, without hope of being saved, upon the 
coast. All these tilings, which we openly avow 
when the danger is past, are concealed at the 
critical moment. " La mer est mauvaise : cativa 
mare ! " was the only admission that could be 
made in the midst of the most terrible tempest. 
This is a singular euphemism. 

All was silent on board the "Prophete Elie." 
M. de Saulcy and I were seated at the stern ; 
before us, Felicien and Edward, fatigued by the 
sea ; further off, Loysel and Belly, who could 
no longer give utterance to those happy sayings 
with which they had so often enlivened our 
travels. The wind blew with incredible vio- 
lence, and at every moment a horrible wave 
rose, threatening, as high as our heads, ready to 
swallow us up ; but the vessel had taken refuge 
in the furrow ploughed by another wave which 
rose before us. 

M. de Saulcy interrupted the silence. "Abbe/' 
said he, " This is the greatest height to which 



OUR ALARM. 189 

the waters of the Mediterranean rise in a tem- 
pest." "Ah! yes/' I replied, as waking from 
a dream. In fact, the man who had acted 
like a child, in getting into a boat for the first 
time in the bay of Muia, enjoyed this terrific 
spectacle as a marvellous vision which had en- 
chanted him. I had familiarized myself with 
these billows, pressing around us, furious and 
thundering. I had studied them in their im- 
petuous movements, and their capricious forms. 
Their most disturbed tossings, their most violent 
blows against our poor vessel, on the point, at 
each moment, of being shattered by the shock, 
whilst impressing me with a vague terror, left 
me a singular clearness of appreciation and of 
analysis. None of the minute details of this 
constantly-changing scene escaped me. Some- 
times my eye followed the agitated crest of 
the wave, rearing itself above the foaming whirl- 
pool, and after hanging for a time suspended, 
falling again with the weight of lead. 

At other times all the tints which the waters 
assumed when borne along by the storm like 
mighty torrents^ were seized upon by my mind 
in their most fleeting hues. I was absorbed in 
the study of the decomposition of light upon 
every wave, as if I were obliged afterwards to 
prepare from recollection the palette of a marine 
painter. The observations cf my friend aroused 



190 



L0UTRAKI. 



me from my own contemplations. We ex- 
changed a few words ; then the same silence 
recommenced. 

At length we arrived at Loutraki ; but the 
captain of the " Prophet e Elie " declared that 
it was quite impossible to approach the coast. 
He cast anchor, and we resigned ourselves to 
pass the night upon deck, surrounded by cover- 
ings and cloaks. We fell asleep to the roar of 
the tempest, and to the regular tossing of the 
vessel, like children, when a mother provokes 
them to sleep, by the aid of monotonous songs 
and the rocking of their cradle. 

The first rays of dawn had scarcely illumined 
the sharp rocks of Loutraki, when the boat of 
the " Prophete Elie " deposited us upon the 
shore. We saw there a spring of hot water 
that issues in abundance from the foot of 
the mountain, at the same level as the sea, 
where it is instantly lost. We started from 
Calamaki with the char-a-bancs, which are 
used for crossing the isthmus. The road is 
excellent. I discover in the midst of the sandy 
soil a most beautiful crocus. I get down from 
the car about the middle of the isthmus, and 
finish the rest of the road in botanising. I 
visit the works undertaken for cutting through 
the isthmus. They consist of a trench which is 
half a mile long, by three hundred feet broad. 



SALAMIS AND EGINA. 



191 



It is scarcely more than thirty feet deep. No- 
thing could be easier than to terminate this 
canal, by the aid of which the passage would be 
considerably shortened in going from Athens to 
the Adriatic. 

November 13.— Here we are at last at Cala- 
maki. We mount on board the " Calypso," 
which is to transport us to the Piraeus. A favour- 
able wind springs up on quitting the shore. 
But soon a dead calm arrests us between the 
islands of Salamis and Egina. We must have 
recourse to the oars, and profit from time to 
time by the few breezes which slightly swell the 
sail. Yesterday a tempest, to-day a calm. We 
do not arrive at the Piraeus until two o'clock in 
the morning. The night has been mild and 
magnificent. 

November 14. — We have still some days to 
devote to our dear Athens. I shall complete 
my religious observations upon Greece. I have 
to visit in detail all the churches. I shall also 
gratify my desire of ascending each day to the 
Acropolis. I wish to carry away, thanks to the 
process of stamping, some pleasing memorials of 
the delicate bas-reliefs of the ancient sculpture. 
The museum of the Propylaea is to become my 
workshop. 



192 



CLERICAL INFLUENCE. 



The renovation of Greece has been for the 
Greek church an immense fact, of which it has 
ingeniously taken advantage. It is closely united 
with the people by the spirit of nationality 
which distinguishes it. Its warm patriotism 
secretly prepared the elements of the insur- 
rection ; and it must be said that it imposed 
upon itself every sacrifice to support it. The 
Greek clergy are therefore eminently popular. 
Everything is done to preserve to them affection 
and influence ; the sacred language of the 
liturgy is the national language, and the believer 
hears in church the prayers composed by the 
greatest saints of the first centuries. The depo- 
sitory of eastern traditions, the Greek clergy 
have in their antecedents nothing but bright 
recollections. They regret nothing in the past. 
They have not been despoiled of privileges ; 
they have only gained in power by the revo- 
lution which has emancipated the country. 

These are precious advantages for the Greek 
clergy. 

But it has two terrible enemies. The re- 
awakening of civil liberty amongst the Greeks 
has also been the re-awakening of freedom of 
thought. This intelligent, lively, and ingenious 
people, this France of the East, lives no longer 
in the ages when faith was accepted in their 
course of instruction, as the heritage of the past. 



PROGRESS OF RATIONALISM. 193 



Greece is accomplishing her eighteenth century. 
She has arrived at the critical age, at the hour 
of investigation. Kationalism overflows in every 
part, and the established church will soon assist, 
powerless or irritated, at the birth of scepticism, 
which from day to day in the upper classes will 
sap traditional belief. As in the bosom of our 
France, this is an age when public worship has 
still its votaries. There is no separation from 
the church ; there is no apparent hostility to 
her ; but the veneration manifested for her has 
a purely human motive. Men accustom them- 
selves to regard her as a useful institution 
as regards the improvement of the masses. 
But it is no longer accorded to her to be the 
sole road of salvation, — a divine institution 
to which has been confided the direction of 
consciences. 

The Greek clergy, who read little, who have 
not in their bosom those clear -sighted minds for 
which the history of Europe is a wise voucher, 
little distrust as yet this negative movement ; 
they repose upon the respectful consideration 
which surrounds them ; they seem not even to 
suspect the future. 

I have no fear of being in this matter a severe 
prophet. These illusions will soon vanish ; and 
that, too, at an hour when the clergy will seek 
to find a remedy for the evil which will then 

o 



194 



DANGERS OF RATIONALISM. 



have attacked the upper and influential classes. 
It will then be too late. If then they would 
speak with authority and determination, they 
will meet with repulsion, they will arouse 
hatred. 

The exceptional position of Greece will hasten 
still more its religious dissolution, There is not 
there, as in Russia and in Austria, a watchful 
police which affords a safeguard against bold- 
ness and free inquiry, by thrusting back to the 
frontier the produce of foreign literature, by the 
aid of which these doctrines infiltrate amongst 
a people. If the established church were to 
demand like restrictions upon the liberty of the 
country, the legislature would unanimously 
repulse it, and the Greek clergy would suffer for 
their unpopularity. One must therefore expect 
to see Christian faith weakened in Greece, until 
unforeseen religious events carry to the bosom 
of the Greek nation, as in the rest of the world, 
the elements of a grand renovation. 

The second enemy of the Greek church, is 
schism. It is from this cause especially feeble. 
The Christian church, divided by schisms, is a 
body whose members, attacked by paralysis, 
stop circulation, and impede the vital develoj)- 
ment. The body suffers, but the members 
suffer still more. 

The Catholic church, the mother of all the 



CONSEQUENCES OF SCHISM. 



195 



churches, by. her admirable principle of unity, is 
weakened by the separation of numerous peo- 
ples who have no longer spiritual communion 
with her. But, for the same reason that she is 
the normal centre of this unity, she has in her- 
self, power and life. Therefore the most pre- 
judiced minds, the least disposed to bow before 
her, nevertheless recognise that she may be 
weakened, humbled, abandoned, but never van- 
quished. 

The separated churches have not this power. 
It is not in the principle of their existence. 
Schism is not a principle. Therefore we see in 
England and in Germany that it is rationalism, 
that is to say, inquiry, study, learning, under no 
matter what name, which brings men back to 
Catholicism. Schism is in her the negation of 
knowledge, of study, of inquiry : it is summed 
up in this expression : u the Established Church." 
It forbids any going back to the first prin- 
ciples of this established church, because the 
study of this establishment is, without contra- 
diction, even by t&e least clear-sighted, a cer- 
tainty of the breach of unity, and separation 
from the mother church. 

What intelligent man in Greece would be 
made to believe that the Greek church has not 
separated herself from Rome ? Schism will 
say, u Believe in the established church." It 

o 2 



196 



EARLY GREEK FATHERS. 



will depart from the principle of infallibility, 
which imposes belief ; but the Catholic will 
appeal to inquiry, and all the pages of the 
history of the church will be unceasing revela- 
tions, which will demonstrate the successive 
separations of the Western churches from the 
Boinish communion. The isolation of the Greek 
church by schism is fatal to her. She thus 
finds herself excluded from the great current of 
religious and progressive ideas that all our 
great men have prescribed, who are become the 
modern exposition of Christianity. The Greek 
church has no doubt in her first Fathers, ad- 
mirable writers, powerful orators, wise apolo- 
gists ; but St. Chrysostom, St. Basil, St. Cyril, 
St. Athanasius, Origen, are men of past strug- 
gles, who never return again upon the same 
ground ; we accept these great men as our 
ancestors in the faith, but they are insufficient 
to give one word in reply to the errors of 
modern times. Seek amongst the Greek Fathers 
for a solution of the attacks of present infidelity ! 
Now, the Greek church, separated from us, 
having neither our Pascal, our Bossuet, our 
Fenelon, nor our Lacordaire, not to mention 
other great men of Catholicism, will remain 
behind, when the spirit of rationalism shall have 
impregnated the earth ; the established church 
will have nothing for her support but those vain 



WANT OF MISSIONS. 



197 



anathemas which rarely prove anything but 
weakness, on the general spread of unbelief. 

Schism deprives the Greek church of that 
powerful arm of proselytism, which the mother 
church, by a special privilege of Providence, 
seems alone to have preserved as one of the 
evident marks of her holiness, and of the im- 
perishable fecundity of the legitimate spouse of 
Jesus Christ. The Greek church has not one 
single priest occupied with the work of the 
apostolate. I have not met in the whole of the 
East one single missionary of that church. 
What an accusing fact ! The Catholic church 
suffers from the error of the separated com- 
munions ; as a compassionate mother, she sends 
her peaceful ambassadors into every country 
where she is unknown, to labour for the reunion 
of the dispersed members of the Christian 
family. 

The Greek church, which takes the title of 
Catholic and of Orthodox, if she is the mother 
church, ought to have the feelings of a mother. 
She ought to suffer from our exclusion from 
unity; she ought to desire that we should be 
united to her, so as no longer to rend, by these 
eternal separations, the robe of Christ. Apostles 
full of zeal, Greek missionaries, if they had 
love and faith for the true church, to which, as 
a divine institution, the greatest power belongs, 



198 



ABSENCE OF RELIGIOUS ENERGY. 



would traverse every part of Europe, enter 
into conference with our doctors, with our 
learned controversialists ; and seek, by every 
means, to bring us back to themselves. They 
do not quit Megaspilon, nor Mount Athos ; 
they repose beneath the shadows of the fine 
cypresses of Vourkano and of Agia-Lavra ; they 
live peaceably at Athens or at Constantinople ; 
and when a vessel sets sail for France, not one 
amongst them says to himself : " I go that I 
may labour to reunite with the Greek church 
the Western branches separated from her." 
They have not, therefore, the power of prose- 
lytism, the fruitfulness of the true church. 

I love the Greek church, and I believe that 
she has a magnificent mission in the East. T 
shall explain in a few pages the result of my 
meditations and of my researches. But I 
accuse her of understandingf nothing 1 of her real 
interests ; and I tremble for the whole church, 
on account of the difficulties which Greece will 
cause us when the hour shall have struck in 
which the idea of a general reconciliation will 
demand only to be realized. 

I have remarked also, at Athens, that the 
religious movement is there completely null. It 
is the routine of the past, it is habit which leads 
to the beautiful little Greek churches, so well 
decorated by their paintings, so well arranged 



SEPARATION OF THE SEXES. 



199 



for devotion, adoration, and prayer. Man, 
according to Eastern ideas, should be dominant 
everywhere. He is paramount in the churches. 
Contrary to France, where the vast naves are 
occupied by women ; in Greece, as throughout 
the East, man occupies the nave : he has the 
best places : he stands or kneels in front of the 
chancel, taking part, by sight and by thought^ 
in the chant and in the sacrifice. Woman is 
banished, either within the grated galleries, or 
to the side aisles subsequently added to the 
churches, or to the end of the nave, where she 
holds her place with children. 1 observed that, 
at Athens, the upper class — the fashionable 
world — go very little to church. It is the man 
of the people — the common labourer, who ob- 
serves with the greatest fidelity the custom of 
public worship. The youth especially do not 
disguise their indifference. The churches at 
Athens are very small. I was surprised to see 
so few of the faithful on the Sunday. It is 
true that they are numerous in the town. 

Besides, religious ignorance is general in 
Greece, even at Athens. Happily their beau- 
tiful liturgies, in a language which they under- 
stand, recall constantly the dogmas of the faith, 
and do not suffer them entirely to forget that 
which is the foundation of Christianity. But 
the teaching of religion is much neglected ; and, 



200 



STRICTNESS IN ORTHODOXY. 



apart from honourable exceptions, the Greek 
clergy themselves neglect study, and possess 
only a superficial knowledge of religion. I 
have always seen in my travels with what in- 
difference and with what carelessness the offices 
of the church were chanted. The Greek priest 
is only great at the holy sacrifice of the altar. 
There is a dignity to which his flowing vest- 
ments, his beard, his long hair, his slow move- 
ments, give something very striking. 

I shall speak hereafter of the religious Church 
of the East ; those of the Greeks are almost the 
same : at least they have the same character. 
The melody of them is beautiful, and eminently 
religious ; but delivered with nasal sounds which 
weary European ears. 

The clergy of Greece are very strict as to 
orthodoxy. They regard the .Russians as dege- 
nerate Christians ; they love them, because they 
love the power of Russia, beneath which they 
shelter themselves ; but as regards themselves, 
the orthodox clergy, the Russians appear a 
species of schismatics. It is needless to say 
that they have a great repugnance to Catholics. 
When a Catholic or an Armenian wishes to enter 
into the Greek communion, he is rebaptized. If 
he is a priest, they rebaptize him and leave him 
in the rank of the faithful. They do not look upon 
his ordination as valid. The Russians act 



THE RUSSIAN CHURCH. 



201 



otherwise. They satisfy themselves with the 
profession of faith of him who leaves other 
Christian communions ; and if he is either 
bishop or priest, they leave him his dignity, and 
recognize the validity of his consecration. 



202 



CATHEDRAL OF ATHENS. 



I 



CHAPTEE IX. 

The Old and Kew Cathedrals at Athens. — Greek Religious 
Art. — The Basilica. — The Chancel "Veil. — Gothic Archi- 
tecture. — Inductive Ornament. — Picture Worship. — 
Absence of Images. — Diptychs. — Figures of the Yirgin. 
— Form of the Churches. — The Royal Palace and its 
Gardens. — National Habits. — The Greek Races. — "We 
are robbed. 

We have many prejudices to overcome to 
reconcile the Greeks to us. But the places 
where the first attempts ought to be made, are 
Athens and the cities of Greece. There you find 
more cultivation of letters, and a little less of 
that rigorous orthodoxy, which becomes more 
and more fierce the further it is removed from 
intercourse with men of another communion. 

I visited attentively the churches of Athens. 
The old cathedral is a veiy small building which 
cannot contain more than three hundred per- 
sons, but which is of a very remarkable con- 
struction. It is entirely of marble, and the 



THE OLD CATHEDRAL. 



203 



walls are in great measure built with the frag- 
ments of ancient temples. 

The old cathedral is no longer used for wor- 
ship. It stands there as a precious relic of 
ancient times. In our Catholic countries, we 
should take care, small as it is, not to abandon 
it in such a manner • the holy mysteries would 
be each day celebrated in it. We have also in 
the West the feeling of respect for buildings 
which time has consecrated. I do not speak of 
the epochs of religious and political revolution. 
We then destroy with barbarism. 

At a few steps from the deserted cathedral 
the modern cathedral is being constructed. The 
building is already raised to a good height; but 
want of funds leaves it incomplete. It is under- 
taken upon a large scale. The beautiful marbles 
of Greece are employed on all those parts which 
require ornament. As one may believe, the 
church stands east and west; the great south 
door was finished when we were at Athens, and 
the greatest part of the marbles of the principal 
door, at the west, were finished, and only waited 
for the builder to fix them in their places. 

I ascertained how the Greeks, who are so 
poor, could raise this sumptuous edifice. When 
there is a poor king, whose civil list does not 
amount to the revenue of many of our rich 
bankers, it is difficult for a city to undertake 



204 GREEK RELIGIOUS ART. 

the immense expenses of such an edifice. Two 
powerful motives in the heart of man procure 
the money devoted to the cathedral, — faith and 
patriotism. 

The rich Greeks who live in foreign lands 
rarely make a will before death, without be- 
queathing a considerable sum for the completion 
of the church of Athens. I was touched by 
this pious affection of the Greeks for the religion 
of their country. Generally, when man has 
gained money by the sweat of his brow, amid 
the Ion of anxieties of a commercial life, he thinks 
little of making a thank-offering as a memorial 
to God. Much may be expected from a people 
possessing such virtues, even amongst the rich. 

Furthermore, Greece is the only people of 
Europe who have, at the present time, their 
religious architecture. This cathedral has the 
precious advantage of belonging to an indigenous 
art, of being constructed according to the man- 
ners and usages of the Greeks, and for the rites 
of their church. This art has been preserved in 
Greece, such as it was centuries ago, because 
the religious customs for which this architecture 
was created are still the same. There is com- 
plete harmony between the Greek worship and 
the Greek churches, between the prevailing 
usages in the nation and the arrangements of 
religious buildings. In such circumstances an 



THE BASILICA. 



205 



art is national; it has the rationale of its exist- 
ence, it possesses its own value. The chancel, 
sombre, narrow, isolated, where the priest alone 
entered; the vast enclosures surrounded by por- 
ticoes, where the people stood, regarding with 
dread the abode of the Deity, become awful 
because the threshold was seldom crossed: all 
this perfectly accorded with the religions of 
antiquity ; temples erected to the true God, not 
even excepting those of Jerusalem and of 
Gerizimj had no other form amongst all nations. 

The large basilica, where light falls in floods, 
where people throng like a great family of 
brothers, which is no longer a place of terror 
and of mystery, which seats the bishop, and 
after him the priests and deacons, in the prin- 
cipal and most conspicuous place at the extre- 
mity of the apse, and places the altar within 
that apse, where are the men of sacrifice and of 
prayer, and the nave filled by the faithful, — this 
basilica suits the brilliant age of the church, 
after its triumphs over paganism. The heart of 
each Christian, after the celebration of the mys- 
teries, becomes the living temple of God, who 
is hidden in the eucharistic bread. "When a 
spiritual church is thus organized, one can un- 
derstand that the enclosure destined to contain 
it is only a place of assembly — ecclesia, and that 
there is in it nothing which recalls those sump- 



206 



INTRODUCTION OF THE VEIL 



tuous temples which antiquity raised at such 
great cost, to believe itself released from con- 
structing in the inner man the true temple of 
God: "Templum Dei estis, Dei sedificati estis." 

When ? by a slow but logical reaction of 
ancient ideas, Christian worship borrowed a 
little of the forms of the past, it brought back 
those religious fears 5 those terrors which a religion 
of love and of light had driven from souls called 
to the new life : the churches regained a little of 
the mysterious arrangements which contributed 
to another view of adoration and of prayer. 
The day when this reparation of the world was 
accomplished, the veil of the temple was rent : 
"Et velum templi scissum est medium." As 
all doctrines are inferential, Christians took 
good care, in the primitive ages, not to rejoin 
the veil, nor to rebuild an inaccessible sanctuary 
which terror durst not enter. 

But man has the instinct of fear in the pre- 
sence of God. There must be in the heart an 
immensity of love, still more of innocence pre- 
served or recovered, to maintain the inward 
worship, the worship where there is abandon- 
ment of self, the worship where few things 
appeal to the senses, because God speaks to the 
heart in ineffable words. One understands, 
therefore, how the veil of the ancient temple, 
the mysterious form of ancient adoration, was 



BEFORE THE CHANCEL. 



207 



repaired in the new law. Alas ! I saw in the 
East that veil close upon the priest during the 
awful sacrifice ; and I asked myself when the 
veil would be again rent, and when those lights 
would again shine which would never grow dim. 

So long as the Oriental church shall remain 
as she is, her worship, otherwise very poetic 
and stamped with a singular majesty, will har- 
monize perfectly with her churches. 

It is from this conformity with modern wor- 
ship that Greek architecture derives its value. 
Such is the explanation of those small, sombre, 
mysterious churches ; of the chancels hidden 
behind painted wood- work, where the saints, 
crowded in two or three stages, seem to inter- 
pose between the victim immolated upon the 
altar and the Christians who come to unite 
themselves to this unbloody immolation. 

The Western church has not retained the veil 
which hides the priest in the chancel during a 
part of the sacrifice, and conceals him from 
sight. She has continued, moreover, as to this 
point, in the observance of the worship of the 
ancient basilicas. 

Still, in the most brilliant centuries of the 
middle age, our Romanesque churches, more 
mysterious than the basilicas, erected also ac- 
cording to the order of ideas which calls reli- 
gious terror to the assistance of faith, were 



208 



GOTHIC ARCHITECTURE. 



replaced by sumptuous buildings, of which the 
arrangement, the decorations especially, have 
nothing in accordance with buildings of anterior 
ages. This new art we have called Gothic, 
because dominant in the Latin church. It 
has produced chefs<V ceuvre of elegance and of 
boldness. 

Evidently such an architecture, in that which 
relates to the requirements of worship, was ad- 
mirably adapted for the age of religious expan- 
sion when it first saw light. Humanity, brought 
back to civilization with such difficulty by the 
church, after six centuries of laborious infancy, 
found itself at its brilliant age of adolescence. 
It overflowed with poetry and life ; there was 
in it, as in the young tree, a superabundance of 
sap and of efflorescence. The soul, ardent, im- 
passioned, impelled by the strong desire of pro- 
duction, required in everything what was great, 
beautiful, and new. But she wished for the 
great which manifested itself in the marvellous, 
which approached the impossible. Hence arose 
those wondrous spires, thrown as it were like 
castles of cards to the breath of the tempest, 
from the foot of which the architects themselves 
hastened to fly as soon as the scaffolding was 
removed, lest they should be crushed by them. 
She wished for what was beautiful, as it is un- 
derstood by people who have still the instincts 



ITS DEVELOPMENT. 



209 



of barbarism ; the beautiful as it slimes in the 
lurid light of a conflagration, in the shaded arch 
of a rainbow, in the most strongly coloured 
pictures of nature. Hence arose those marvel- 
lous painted windows, enchanting creations of 
Gothic art, which change an earthly church 
into a church than which the imagination can- 
not picture to itself anything more beautiful 
in heaven. She wished for novelty, because 
she herself was something quite new in history. 
Her fathers had made piles of ruins of the chefs- 
dJceuvre of ancient art ; you could not speak to 
her of the value of the works of the past. But 
in Gothic art all was new. The column shot up 
from the earth in delicate clusters ; from it ex- 
panded mouldings over the vaulted roofs. All 
that poetry could invent that was light, capri- 
cious, and fantastic, was extended in living, 
pure sculpture, gliding over the arcades of the 
porticoes, over the capitals and the mouldings ; 
wound round the cornices ; and showed thousands 
of strange spectres which the art of the en- 
chanter had suddenly brought into existence. 

These magical structures, called cathedrals, 
were then, in an eminent degree, the religious 
and national art of the middle ages in the West. 
They satisfied all the instincts, the aspirations, 
and the needs of humanity, in the most poetical 
age through which it has ever passed. 

r 



210 



INDUCTIVE ORNAMENT. 



But now humanity is more mature or more 
aged, and its youthful warmth grown cold ; and, 
like a meditative and reflective man, has less 
need of outward objects and splendid images to 
realize its thoughts ; it less requires those helps 
which other and more susceptible generations 
found so useful to adoration and prayer. Gothic 
art, therefore, whatever may be said upon the 
point, is no longer a national art in France, 
notwithstanding its indisputable beauty, because 
it is no longer in harmony with our religious 
instincts, and our inward needs. "We read, 
and we cannot give up reading and go to 
church. The cathedral, with sombre painted 
windows, was built for periods when no book was 
carried to church. If you keep to the Gothic 
style, will you rob it of its most splendid orna- 
ment ? It will then hardly be Gothic. If you 
insist upon having the stained-glass windows, 
this will be saying to the faithful : " Leave your 
prayer-books at home." What will religion gain 
by this ? You will throw us back into bar- 
barism. The church does not wish this. The 
good canons of the last two centuries were quite 
as logical as those who paid in hard cash for the 
magnificent cathedral windows ; yet they piti- 
lessly took down those rich panes, and replaced 
them with plain glass. These forerunners of an 
enlightened age said ingenuously : " Men can 



CHRISTIAN ART. 



211 



now read in the choir and in the nave, yet we 
treat them as barbarians." They thought that 
the moral wants of the church required atten- 
tion, even though they might interfere with 
the beauty of the buildings. We say to the 
faithful : " Read if you can ; but we must have 
Gothic art ; Gothic art is Christian art." And 
from love to art, we shall destroy faith. 

Again, have we sought, in analyzing modern 
religious needs, for an art in harmony with 
them ! Have we found any art which is 
remarkable, or worthy of Christianity ? I do 
not think so, Our art is only on a level with 
our Christianity. From St. Peter's at Rome, 
and St. Sulpice to St. Genevieve and La Made- 
leine, we have spent millions in producing an 
imitative architecture, a poor eclectic art, quite 
in harmony with our mixed philosophy. After 
we have gone back to Christianity, our art 
will not be so mixed, so pagan, or so wretched. 
When the body is made young again, its dress 
is of no consequence ; beauty is still beautiful in 
any garment. 

After the unfinished cathedral of Athens, I 
carefully visited the other churches, and often 
happened to be present during mass. The 
women are always strictly separated from the 
men. They generally occupy the left aisle of the 
church. They have a door by which they enter 

p 2 



212 



PICTURE WORSHIP. 



the church, and through which men never pass. 
I noticed, however, that in the original plan of 
the Athenian churches, this aisle, which is now 
exclusively devoted to the women, did not exist. 
It has been added to some after their erection, 
and forms, consequently, a supplementary aisle, 
which destroys the regularity of the building. 
The influence of Asiatic manners, which require 
the separation of the sexes, has been very strong 
in Greece, owing to its occupation by the 
Turks. The influence of Christianity tended to 
the emancipation of woman, but has been driven 
back by Islamism. 

The Greeks are very devoted to picture- 
worship. On entering a church, you find a 
figure painted upon wood near the holy- water 
basin, and you kiss it after having taken some 
holy water. The chancel of every church is 
separated from the nave by a wooden screen, in 
which there are three doors. At certain parts 
of the mass, the middle door is covered with a 
curtain, This screen is covered with several 
rows of pictures. The pictures are only of 
small dimensions, and represent the figures or 
portraits of saints. I did not meet, in Greece 
nor throughout the East, with a single picture 
a yard in height. 

The figures of the Greeks are painted after an 
established type. There are hieratic traditions 



ABSENCE OF IMAGES. 



213 



from which the painters never depart. The 
ruling thought is simply to recall by these 
figures the idea of the saint. There is nothing 
like naturalness, or dramatic art. The intro- 
duction into religious paintings of those atti- 
tudes and passionate expressions which are con- 
stantly found even in our master-pieces would 
be considered as impious. The Eastern church 
has proscribed this. The picture recalls the 
saint, as a portrait brings before us a father or 
a revered ancestor. This judiciousness in the 
types of the figures gives to the Greek churches 
a charming stamp of religious simplicity, although 
they are so numerous in them. 

Sculptured images are carefully removed from 
the Greek churches, as looking too much like 
idolatry. The crucifixes represent the Saviour 
painted on the wood of the cross, but not sculp- 
tured in relief as with us. I do not recol- 
lect having seen a single statue in the Chris- 
tian churches of the East. They are rare also 
in the Catholic churches which use the Latin 
ritual. 

The figure of the Virgin is very general in the 
churches. She constantly carries the infant 
Jesus. The Virgin, represented by herself, is 
not understood in the East. The words " Mother 
of God," in Greek and in monogram near the 
head of the Virgin, which are her most glorious 



214 



DIPTYCHS. 



title, would be taken from her, in the opinion of 
the Orientals, were she represented without the 
infant God. 

An ideal, but, in my opinion, by no means an 
orthodox feeling, is day by day substituting, in 
the West, the Virgin considered abstractedly, 
for the Virgin honoured with divine maternity. 
A luminous cluster, called rayons, is suspended 
from her hands like two large palettes, in place 
of the sweet Saviour of men borne lovingly in 
her arms. This is called "an Immaculate." Our 
pious mothers spoke of the Virgin as " Our 
Lady." Let us be permitted to love the Virgin 
as our mothers loved her. In France we have 
communities of men and women, wherein the 
statue of the Virgin is everywhere to be found, 
and where it would be difficult, excepting in 
some odd corner, to find a representation of Our 
Lady with the infant J esus. This is done with- 
out any evil intention ; but the Council of 
Ephesus thought differently. 

Delightful diptychs are still frequently found 
in Greece ; they are two tablets of wood fastened 
together with a hinge, and shutting like a book. 
The inside of each tablet represents a figure. 
The Virgin is always represented on one side of 
the diptych, and a saint on the other. Those 
figures of the Virgin are always drawn with the 
infant Jesus, and are painted upon a gold ground. 



FIGURES OF THE VIRGIN 



215 



They have a special character, which is not 
rendered in any of our pictures on canvass of 
Mary. With us, every painter has a different 
form under which he represents the mother of 
the Saviour ; here the type is invariably the 
same : it is a piece of hieratic art, and is essen- 
tially religious. They do not try to make the 
figure of the woman more or less beautiful and 
noble ; nor to represent the mother smiling at 
the first smiles of the infant God asleep upon 
her knees, and showing him to a young St. 
John, in a group called a Holy Family. There 
is nothing of the kind there ; but you have the 
mother of God in a noble, calm, sweet, and 
impassible figure, in an attitude consecrated by 
time, and reproduced, with unvarying form, by 
all painters upon the diptychs. Such are the 
hieroglyphics upon the buildings of Egypt, the 
same under Sesostris as under the successor of 
Alexander. This stereotyped Virgin is the 
figure of Mary. In this art, there is no natu- 
ralism, nothing that lets the woman be con- 
jectured. The artist rises to the highest spiri- 
tualism, and has a right to write near the 
nimbus which encircles the head of Mary, the 
sacred sigla for " Mother of God." 

These diptychs, some of which are very beau- 
tiful, have received the kisses and the prayers of 
several generations. They are preserved in a 



2J6 



FORM OF THE CHURCHES. 



small recess, usually near the bottom of every 
Greek house. I brought away, as a memorial 
of my pilgrimage, one of these diptychs, the 
gold of which has been tarnished by many kisses, 
perhaps many tears. It belonged to the monas- 
tery of Daphni. 

I drew the plan of several of the churches of 
Athens The apses are not always circular, some- 
times they are pentagonal. Of this form is the 
church of Agios (St.) Theodoros, which I in- 
spected on the 18th of November. 

I particularly remarked that the windows 
of three apses and of the two extremities of the 
arm of the Greek cross, have a mullion in the 
centre, by which they are divided into two bays. 
The large windows of the transept, at Daphni, 
have two of these mullions, and are thus 
divided into three bays. The middle is the 
highest. 

All these churches have not the form of a 
Greek cross. Some of them consist of three 
longitudinal aisles, terminated by three apses. 
The narthex, at the entrance, supports the 
women's gallery, which thence runs along over 
the two side aisles. The cupola is invariably in 
the centre. I have not found any churches in 
Greece with several cupolas, such as St. Mark 
of Venice, St. Front of Perigueux, and several 
others in Perigord, Quercy, and Angoumois. 



CUPOLAS AND BELFRIES. 



217 



The cupola of the latter church is sup- 
ported by pillars, in which are four demi- 
columns united together and supporting capitals 
and double arches, exactly the same as in 
our Romanesque churches of the twelfth cen- 
tury. 

I cannot better terminate this cursory view of 
the Christian edifices of Athens than by giving 
a few details of the Agio Georgi church which 
was in course of construction near the Hotel 
de P Orient, where we stayed. The inside works 
were still in progress. 

In the structure only one apse has been pre- 
served. The cupola is supported by four columns- 
There is a narthex, with upper galleries for the 
women, as in the small church just described. 
I noticed that the unfinished cathedral, this 
Agio Georgi church, and another recently- 
finished in the large transverse street of Athens, 
which begins at the Tower of the Winds, were 
all of considerable dimensions, while the old 
churches are extremely small. 

The two belfries of the new church of St. 
Theodoros will also be noticed. Greek churches 
never have any belfries. Apart, however, from 
these slight differences, the modern churches of 
Athens are built upon precisely the same plan 
as the ancient. The semicircular arch is exclu- 
sively predominant ; and the beautiful cupola of 



218 



THE PALACE. 



the East, without those heavy lanterns with 
which our churches are disfigured, continues to 
give them that noble character which it is as 
hard for us to attain , as for our unsteady Western 
nature to acquire the majestic dignity of the 
native of the East. 

I did not go into the interior of the King's 
palace. When a man has the Acropolis of 
Athens before him, he is not much tempted to 
go through a suite of apartments in the modern 
style of decoration. The Greeks have made 
the mistake of building an immense barrack by 
way of a palace, instead of a magnificent struc- 
ture in which Pentelican marble should have 
been displayed in beautiful Doric columns, to 
recall somewhat the glory of the past. A 
palace, constructed in the form of an oblong 
square, with four main buildings, the principal 
front of which should have been embellished 
with a peristyle, and the interior with a large 
colonnade, would have struck the attention of 
all by its noble simplicity. 

The site of the palace is magnificent. It 
commands the city ; in front of it is a beautiful 
square. On the other side, large gardens, slop- 
ing down to the Ilissus, have been laid out. 
The superintendent of the King's garden did me 
the honour of conducting me over them ; he was 
kind enough to offer me, as a memorial of my 



ITS GARDENS. 



219 



visit to Athens, a collection of cactuses, which 
are there grown in the open ground, without 
any other precaution for the most delicate, than 
sheltering them at mid-day. I saw a curious 
mosaic, discovered in this garden, on the bank 
of the Ilissus, which has suffered no injury from 
time. 

Beautiful storks walked about on the broad 
lawns, without troubling themselves at our pre- 
sence. The birds that travellers have seen 
building their nests on the ruins of the Acropolis 
are daws, whose joyous sports and animated 
cries give some life to these wonderful ruins, 
which would be too sad to look upon had not 
ever-bountiful nature filled them with birds, 
insects, and flowers. 

We are going to leave Athens ; the day for our 
departure is fixed. We have seen much upon 
this soil, which is so full of memorials of glory 
and of art. But it costs us not a little to leave 
the city. Poor Athens ; how sweet is thy 
name to my ear ! What indelible impressions 
hast thou left upon the heart of him who, for 
thirty years, from the earliest aspirations of his 
youth, has dreamt about thee. Henceforth you 
will be to me only a source of regret. Yet I 
will not weep over thee ; my heart has reserved 
all her tears for Jerusalem. 

At Athens calm and sweet thoughts arise, 



220 



GREEK CONSTITUTION. 



There nothing saddens, nothing wounds yon. 
If the ruin of so manv wonderful buildings gives 
you a secret sorrow, yet it is tempered by the 
inexpressible joys which arise from those which 
still remain to be contemplated. You see a 
nation in its second youth, breathing freely, for 
nearly a quarter of a century freed from servitude 
to an uncivilized people, mistress of its soil ; 
loving its country doubly because that country 
is its birthplace, and has been gained by con- 
quest. The people possess free institutions ; 
you only feel there the power of the gendarme, 
who at times domineers somewhat rudely, as 
we restrain passionate children. But he only 
executes the law. There is freedom of speech 
for all. The Greeks have much to do ; their in- 
stitutions resemble too closely those of England, 
and do not suit a race of mountaineers. Greece 
plainly required a federal constitution in which 
the aristocratical element, represented by the 
large landowners, should have been wisely tem- 
pered with the democratical. Greece, for a 
long time to come, will be another Switzerland, 
and not a France, in spite of other striking re- 
semblances to us. European diplomacy has not 
taken any of these things into account, having 
been, for the last half century, smitten with the 
theory of constitutional charters. The Greeks 
have had thrust upon them an English royalty, — 



NATIONAL HABITS. 



221 



fictitious power entrusted to a dynasty which has 
no root in the nation, — a senate which badly 
represents the large property-holders who, by 
the mistaken contrivance of the charter, have 
been thrown back into the legislative assembly, 
where they act a more popular part. The na- 
tion evidently has the elements of a strong and 
durable government, provided that it springs 
up in the heart of the nation itself, and is not 
copied from strangers. 

In the last days that I spent at Athens I felt 
a peculiar pleasure in comparing the modern 
with the ancient Greeks. 

Whatever men may say, nations do not change. 
The influence of climate on the great families of 
men is such that, in spite of invasion and sla- 
very, the primitive instinct of nations continually 
predominates. Are not the Frenchmen of the 
present day the very same as those quick, talk- 
ative, and adventurous Gauls, who invaded Italy, 
made Borne tremble, and then sought for a 
delightful country in Asia-Minor, hard by the 
cradle of the human race ? In what have they 
changed ? Though endless shocks now disturb 
their social existence, yet do not these witness 
to a powerful instinct for a life of liberty, which 
formed the happiness and pride of their fore- 
fathers. Do you want to see the ancient Athe- 
nians ? If so, go to Athens, collect all your 



222 



DIGNITY OF THE NATION. 



historical knowledge, recall all those details of 
private life which the scene and books give, 
and which are more precious than history itself 
or rather are the ethnographical history of a 
nation. Then study the modern Greek, now 
he has overthrown a senseless dominion, and is 
a free Hellene in that beautiful country which 
was the classical land of liberty, and you will 
find the people intelligent, spirituel, brilliant, 
quick, passionately devoted to forensic struggles, 
loving art and literature, and showing by the 
grace and richness even of their dress, that 
they carry in themselves the future of a great 
nation. 

There is no people in Europe whose national 
appearance is more noble, and has more real 
dignity, than that of Greece. M. de Lamartine, 
who, in the first days of their independence, 
saw these representatives of an energetic 
people assembled at Napoli di Romania, in a 
palace made of wretched planks, was struck by 
it, although elsewhere he shows himself far 
from favourable to the Greeks. The nation will 
obtain undying glory, from having resolved, on 
awaking, that in public affairs, and in good 
society, only the language of ancient Greece 
should be spoken. And this resolution was not 
a transitory piece of pride, but has been fully 
realized. You may, when you please, go and 



EASY MANNERS. 



223 



still hear the affairs of the Greek nation discussed 
in the language of Pericles and Demosthenes. 

The manners of the young Greeks are easy. 
We must forgive them a little affectation, and, 
to speak my mind fully, something feminine. 
A certain kind of grace is not intended for 
man ; his proper character is nobility, dignity, 
distinction. The young Greeks pay too much 
attention to elegance. The Greek dress con- 
sists of a close coat, fitting tightly to the figure, 
a white tunic folded in numerous folds, and 
reaching down to the knees, called a fustanel, 
and gaiters without buttons, which go from the 
knee down to the shoe. The gaiters and the 
close coat are made of cloth, covered with em- 
broidery, and arabesque ornaments very deli- 
cately worked and extremely fine. A Greek 
dress, such as this, is sometimes worth, from 
the richness of the embroidery, two thousand 
francs. The fustanel is loose from the girdle. 
M. Kopaniza measured for us the quantity of 
stuff in his fustanel. It is one of the most 
elegant dresses that can be worn. Nevertheless 
I prefer the rich dress, consisting of the kafieh, 
the robe, and the machla, such as is worn in the 
East, amongst the Arab tribes. 

The places of general resort at Athens are 
the cafes, the square close to the market, and 
the large transverse street leading to the Tower 



224 REMAINS OF EASTERN CUSTOMS. 

of the Winds. Their favourite game is dominoes. 
From hatred of the Turks, their ancient op- 
pressors, they have given up a host of customs, 
brought in by them. I am surprised that they 
have preserved the Turkish chaplet, which con- 
sists of beads threaded upon a silk cord, which 
they finger perpetually from morning to night, 
at home and in the streets. It seems to me 
like carrying in one's hands a patent of care- 
lessness and idleness. The Turks, at the least, 
repeat some verses of the Koran upon their 
chaplets, like the Ave-Maria is said amongst 
us ; but it is far too puerile to finger this trum- 
pery plaything merely for the sake of a good 
attitude in the street. 

I very often noticed the liking of the Greeks 
for bodily movement, lively conversation, and 
everything which excites mental pleasure or 
bodily activity. They might be called a nation 
of young men, taking up arms with delight for 
the first time. A Greek does not think himself 
a man except he has a gun on his shoulder, and 
pistols and dagger in his belt. 

They are, like the Arabs, extremely tempe- 
rate. They are accustomed to a life of hard- 
ship, are not at all ambitious, and their mean 
houses seem to them like palaces. Under so 
genial a climate, they lead the careless and 
adventurous life of a savage. They have all 



WANT OF ACTIVITY. 



225 



the tastes for it. Agricultural labour is most 
repugnant to them. If they come upon a large 
stone in ploughing, they go round it rather than 
throw the stone out of the field ; if it is a small 
clump of shrubs, they do not pull it up ; to do 
this a pick-axe would be wanted, and that is too 
heavy to handle. They are satisfied with 
ploughing close to it, and the triumphant shrubs 
receive greater strength from the earth which 
has been stirred up at their roots. They are 
never known to remove the stones which fall 
down from the mountains and block up the 
roads. 

I noticed a little activity only in the trading 
towns. At Tripolizza, Mistra, Yostiza, and 
Argos, the Greek traders were in their shops, 
and appeared to like work. 

The Lacedemonians are the finest Greek 
race. The mountaineers of Taygetus, and the 
inhabitants of Sparta and of Mistra, are remark- 
ably handsome men. I cannot say so much of 
the women. It is rare to find among them any 
strikingly beautiful. Their dress is generally 
very untidy, and sometimes they are so dirty 
as to be repulsive. They do not often, however, 
appear in public. Men only are seen in the 
streets of the towns, and they are always out of 
doors. 

We had an opportunity of seeing the national 

Q 



226 



Antonio's soiree. 



dances at the house of Antonio, who, before our 
departure, gave a soiree on our account. We 
went to the house of our illustrious friend in an 
open carriage, and found that he had assembled 
Constantine, our cook, and the agoyats of the 
expedition. Their relations and friends, with 
their wives and daughters, had been invited. 
All this beau monde of Athens was in holiday 
dress. In honour of our party there was a 
good deal of Greek music, and of Greek dances. 
Antonio laughed in his sleeve, as he served us 
with his hot wine. We had no scruple about 
taking it ; he had made us earn it by not 
a few privations. We noticed some national 
airs of an expressive character, which might be 
traced back to antiquity, as well as some dances. 
I left the small room, in which we were choking, 
at an early hour, and went, in a splendid night, 
to obtain a far greater sight, the view of the 
Acropolis. 

We took leave of our friends at Athens, of 
our good Colonel Touret, who loves the Greeks 
like his own children, and of M. Sabatier, one of 
the most intelligent representatives of France 
in the East. I went to shake hands with the 
cure of Athens. I cast a last look upon the 
Acropolis, the Pnyx, and the Areopagus, and 
we set out. 

Following the route by which we had first 



WE ARE ROBBED. 



227 



entered Athens, we soon reached the Piraeus. 
The Greeks, knowing that M. Delessert was 
taking away in his carpet-bag a magnificent 
collection of silver coins, endeavoured to steal 
it. They made a mistake, and took mine. It 
contained a valuable note-book, in which were 
my notes and sketches. It was a loss that 
I deeply felt, but which I repaired by the help 
of my learned friend's notes. I did not bear 
very much malice against the Greeks on this 
account. The " Mahmoudie" took us on board, 
and brought us to Syra. 



Q 2 



228 



SYR A. 



CHAPTER X. 

The Priest's Benediction. — The Bishop of Syra, — The Abbe 
Marinelli. — Decline of Catholicism. — The Clergy of ISTaxia. 
— Catholics of Greece. — "Want of Literature. — Absence 
of Schools. — Greek Fanaticism. — The proposed Council. 
Necessity of Action. — "We reach Asia. — The Oriental 
Bace. — The Bridge of Caravans. — The Biver Meles. — 
Hideous Black. 

November 22. — We landed at Syra. This 
time I made haste to go up to the upper town, 
where the Catholic cathedral and the bishop's 
house are situated. In passing through the 
lower town I went by the Greek church, which 
has been newly built. It was, on that day, 
one of the grand fetes of the Greek calen- 
dar. I saw a multitude of the faithful returning 
from service. I visited this church. There was 
still a great number of people, who, before their 
departure, went from picture to picture, kissing 
the figures. I saw also some mothers, who 
drew near to the priest, still dressed in his 
priestly garments, to ask of him those benedic- 



THE PRIEST'S BENEDICTION. 



229 



tions which stern men would proscribe, but 
which are, however, a consolation amidst the 
troubles of this life, and the secret sorrows of 
the heart, because they awaken hope. This 
pious ceremony, the particulars of which I have 
forgotten, affected me greatly. 

The church is rich and extensive. I ex- 
amined the pictures in it, which did not strike 
me greatly, except to see the precision with 
which the Greek painters have preserved the 
religious types which have been handed down 
by tradition. Contrary to what is the case in 
France, where the women form the largest por- 
tion of the congregation in our churches, the 
crowd I saw at Syra coming forth from the dif- 
ferent streets consisted chiefly of men. They 
seemed to belong to all classes. 

The upper town of Syra is situated upon the 
summit of a very abrupt hill. The cathedral 
stands on its most elevated point. The bishop's 
house adjoins the church. I introduced myself 
to M. Alberti, coadjutor of Syra. Athens is, as 
is well known, included in the diocese of Syra. 
This see is, therefore, of great importance; and I 
was anxious to test the information I had ob- 
tained in Greece on the state of religion, and 
the possibility of the reunion of the eastern 
communions, with the only Catholic bishop that 
I had yet met. M. Alberti is a Smyrniot, of 



230 



THE BISHOP OF STRA. 



most gentle address, and most easy manners. 
I was received by him with that ease and 
noble familiarity which are peculiar to the 
East. He first of all expressed his regret at 
not being able to present me to Monseigneur 
the bishop of Syra, a venerable old man, of 
whom he spoke to me with the affection of a son 
for a revered father. The bishop was then 
taking rest. 

The conversation then began, and I found it 
full of interest. "We were in a large room, with 
very unpretending divans placed round it ; there 
was no sign of luxury in this episcopal resi- 
dence. Monseigneur, the coadjutor, speaks 
very good French. I acquainted him at once 
with the object of my religious researches 
during my travels. I communicated my thoughts 
to him. I begged him to give me as many 
particulars as possible, because they were to 
form the materials of the book which I intended 
to publish on my arrival in France, upon the 
question of the reconciliation of Christian com- 
munions. The prelate, with kind consideration, 
answered all nry questions. I retain a very 
pleasant recollection of this my first conference 
with the bishops of the Eastern church. It was 
an auspicious beginning for me. As I was 
taking leave of M. Alberti, " This is not all," 
said he, " I am going to introduce you to one 



THE ABBE MAKINELLI. 



231 



of my most distinguished priests, in whom I 
have fall confidence. He has been engaged 
for many years, as well as you, upon this great 
question." He then took me to the house of 
the Abbe Marinelli, who lives a few steps from 
the episcopal residence. 

I found the latter in his library. I had hardly 
uttered the usual compliments, and said a few 
words on the object of my inquiries in the East, 
than the large and noble face of M. Marinelli 
seemed to light up as with a light from heaven. 
To the eyes of this man, imprisoned upon a rock 
in the midst of the Archipelago, I was like an un- 
looked-for apparition, of which for twenty years 
he had had a forefeeling, at last realized against all 
hope. (i And you," he said, f# are the man of the 
West towards whom my instincts have so often 
been directed. I said to myself, as I read over 
your books, your pamphlets, and your papers, 
Is there no one in Europe, or in France which 
gives an impetus to the world, who will have the 
courage to come amongst us ; examine the way 
to a great reconciliation ; prepare the world by 
degrees for its accomplishment, and speak him- 
self, and urge others to speak also, upon the 
subject in Catholic countries ? Such a man is at 
last found, and you are he." 

The sympathies of two hearts suddenly made 
known to one another, will easily be understood; 



232 



THE ABBE MARINELLI. 



and the pleasures they experienced for three long 
hours, in mingling the thoughts which their 
minds had so long fed upon, looking upon them- 
selves as great friends, as though they had lived 
together for twenty years, and in the same 
country. They have now only the remembrance 
of those fleeting moments which were spent in 
pouring out the same desires, and the same 
aspirations after the happiness of the Christian 
world. But they are joined and united together 
by the bonds of an indissoluble friendship. 

M. Marinelli is about forty years old. He is 
tall, thin, and of a stern and intelligent appear- 
ance. He is unaffected like all good men, and 
modest like all learned ones ; he is, too, very 
frank, which in Greece is a very rare thing. I 
was told that the bishopric of Santorini is des- 
tined for him, after the death of his uncle, the 
present bishop. I have since learnt by a letter 
from Greece, that he has been proposed for the 
archbishopric of Naxia, the metropolitan see of 
the Greek Catholic church. 

I was anxious not to lose a moment of the 
precious interview that Providence had procured 
for me at the outset of my journey. I put, 
therefore, a great many questions to the Abbe 
Marinelli. He has studied religious questions 
more than any other man in the East, and on 
account of his learning and piety is held in great 



DECLINE OF CATHOLICISM. 



233 



regard, not only by the Greek Catholics, but 
also at the Propaganda in Rome. 

He gave me the number of the Greek Catho- 
lics on the continent and in the islands. It 
amounts to about sixteen thousand. In 1666, 
Father Richard, a missionary in Negropont, 
estimated their number at upwards of eighty 
thousand. The Abbe Marinelli attributes the 
decline of Catholicism in Greece to the religious 
orders who, from the 1 7th century, have been 
almost exclusively entrusted with the pastoral 
care of the churches. So long as a nation has 
not a native clergy connected with it by ties ot 
blood, and consequently attached to it by the 
love of kindred and of country, that nation holds 
its religious opinions cheap on all occasions. 
The Catholic parishes of Greece were entrusted 
of all others to the Capuchins. "When political 
disturbances arose, and the monks lost their 
hold upon the community, the poor churches were 
forsaken. Catholic churches have been lately 
found in Greece with the last ornament used in 
the celebration of the mass folded up in a corner, 
and untouched since the departure of the monks. 
The forsaken parishes grew weaker and weaker 
in their orthodoxy, and at last went to the 
national church for the religious succour which 
Catholicism could no longer give them. This 
experiment decided the question. 



234 



THE BISHOP OF SAOTORINI. 



Only a native clergy have the elements of per- 
petuity. Rome now understands this, and the 
Propaganda has lately adopted the principle of 
native clergy for foreign missions (through the 
zeal of an intelligent and earnest Frenchman, 
M. Luquet, Bishop of Hesebon,) to be appointed 
to their office by an episcopate of the country. 
In this event the Bishop of Hesebon triumphed 
over the powerful opposition of a religious 
society which has always professed the contrary 
system. Rome happily yielded to the reasons 
brought forward by the learned French bishop 
in favour of this measure. 

The Catholic church has an archbishopric and 
three bishoprics in the kingdom of Greece. 
Naxia is the metropolitan archbishopric, the 
others are Syra, Tinos, and Santorini. The late 
archbishop of Naxia died last J une. M. Alberti, 
coadjutor of Syra ? is become titular bishop by 
the decease of the late bishop.* M. Francis 
Zaloni, a Tiniot, is the bishop of Tinos, having 
succeeded as coadjutor to M. Gobinelli, who died 
in 1850. The bishop of Santorini is M. Francis 
Cuculla, a Syriot, maternal uncle of the Abbe 
Marinelli. 

All these bishops, together with the bishop 

* The funeral oration for this prelate was delivered by 
the Abbe Marinelli. It was published in the " Augsburger 
Postzeitung," No. 20, 16 May, 1852. 



THE CLERGY OF NAXIA. 



235 



of Chios, an island belonging to Turkey, are 
suffragans of Naxia. 

The number of Catholics in the island is, at 
Naxia, about three hundred ; at Syra, about five 
thousand ; at Tinos, about eight thousand ; at 
Santorini, about five hundred. 

Naxia possesses a chapter. The other islands 
have no chapter, but their clergy enjoy the 
privilege of electing the capitular vicar when 
the see is vacant. The clergy of Naxia, like the 
population, is very much reduced. It numbers 
only six priests, who are almost incapable of dis- 
charging the sacred ministry, from old age or sick- 
ness. The Lazarists support two monks at Naxia, 
where they have considerable property. There 
is besides, a Capuchin missionary, and also a 
convent of Ursuline nuns. 

The clergy is more numerous at Syra. It 
consists of thirty priests * there is, besides, a 
Capuchin missionary living in the convent, 
which is under the protection of France. There 
are also at Syra four Jesuit missionaries belong- 
ing to Sicily, two fathers and two lay -brethren. 

The clergy of Tinos is also very numerous : 
it numbers upwards of thirty-five priests, who 
have the pastoral charge of the different villages 
in the island. 

The clergy of Santorini is about twenty 
priests ; there are also two Lazarists, with some 



236 



CATHOLICS OF GREECE. 



sisters of charity, and a convent of Domi- 
nicans. 

There are very few Catholics in continental 
Greece. The Bishop of Syra is honoured with 
the title of Apostolical Delegate for continental 
Greece, and those countries belonging to Greece 
to which the jurisdiction of the other bishops 
does not extend. This title was given to the 
Bishop of Syra by Gregory XVI, in 1834. 
There are some Catholic missions in Attica and 
in Peloponnesus, served by Syriot missionaries ; 
at Athens, on the Piraeus ; at Heraclion, in 
Attica (a Bavarian colony) ; in the Morea, at 
Patras, Nauplia, and Navarino, which last is, at 
present, vacant. The Catholic population of 
the continent of Greece is estimated at two 
thousand five hundred souls. 

The Greek clergy, not Catholic, had lately 
seen the number of their bishops reduced to five ; 
a law brought before the Chambers has now 
raised the number to twenty-four ; twenty for 
continental Greece and the Morea, and four for 
the Archipelago ; that is, for Syra, Naxia, 
Andros, and Santorini. Of these, eleven are 
archbishops ; they fill the sees of Corinth, and 
the chief seats of the nomarchies ; the metro- 
politan is the bishop of the capital for the 
time being. 

The inferior clergy is very numerous in Greece, 



WANT OF SCHOOLS. 237 

and new priests are frequently ordained. The 
clergy, in general, have no ecclesiastical instruc- 
tion. They were fanatical, credulous, ignorant, 
and hardly moral. But they are now about to 
rise again, by their schools, seminaries, colleges, 
and universities, if not in morals and piety, at 
least in education. One day they will be able 
to contest the palm of learning with the Catholic 
clergy. 

The Abbe Marinelli has often pointed out 
these facts to the congregation of the Propa- 
ganda at Borne, and has requested them to take 
into consideration some measures for restoring 
the ascendancy of the Catholic clergy ; but 
nothing has yet been done. 

The Greek Catholics are without schools, col- 
leges, or universities; they have only some 
small Lancasterian schools for children. There 
are no longer any seminaries for the clergy. 
The one at Syra was given up about two years 
ago, from want of funds. Naxia and Santorini 
are altogether without any. At Tinos, there is 
a defunct diocesan seminary. The Greeks, on 
the contrary, have well-organized schools, gym- 
nasia, and colleges, with a good staff of pro- 
fessors, seminaries for the clergy, and Otho's 
University at Athens. 

The Catholics are in want of : 1st, a printing- 



238 WANT OF LITERATURE. 

office ; 2nd, newspapers, and other periodical pub- 
lications, religious and political, which would 
have immense influence in the heart of the 
nation ; 3rd, books of controversy and of religious 
instruction in their own language. The Abbe 
Marinelli insisted greatly upon these three 
points; he understands all the importance of 
the religious press in modern times, and is con- 
vinced that its action must powerfully favour 
the apostolate. A Catholic paper, published 
at Athens, in the national language, not the 
organ of a backward party, but which developed 
the broad and advanced principles of Catho- 
licism, would soon exert great influence through- 
out Greece, and would prepare the way for 
the reconciliation of the two churches. Books 
of controversy, written in a judicious and tem- 
perate manner, respectful towards individuals, 
and tolerant towards men's intentions, would 
be read also, and become a powerful arm in 
favour of orthodoxy. 

The Greek Catholics are generally poor, which 
obliges them to leave their country, to the great 
injury of religion and of their families; a loan 
institution, founded by Europe, would be needed 
to support them, and make them advances at a 
low rate of interest, which would spare them 
from the stern necessity of expatriation, and 



ABSENCE OF SCHOOLS. 239 

save them from total ruin. The Greeks, on the 
contrary, are rich in landed property, or become 
so by commerce. 

Some educated men would be required in 
Catholic Greece. The want of knowledge every 
day lowers their religious and political position. 
From lack of regular seminaries, the Catholic 
clergy of Greece, apart from some small and 
honourable exceptions, are ignorant, but gene- 
rally of exemplary morals, and desirous of im- 
provement ; but they are without the necessary 
means. They have neither private nor public 
libraries. The Abbe Marinelli selling his hat 
to buy books, proves how completely destitute 
the Catholic clergy are in this respect. 

In Greece there are never any ecclesiastical 
conferences, diocesan visits, or synods. The 
bishops have not the energy and ardour of 
French bishops; they are good ecclesiastics, 
but there are no men among them of enlarged 
views or organizing genius. 

An apostolical visitation would be necessary 
throughout Greece. Pius IX., acquainted with 
the wants of this interesting country, had or- 
dered one in 1846, investing M. Ferrari, whom 
he sent to the Sultan in quality of Nuncio, with 
the title of Apostolical Visitor of Turkey and 
of Greece. But he came back without having 
accomplished this very interesting part of his 



240 



THE QUESTION OF REUNION. 



mission : the remedy has not been applied, 
although the evil and the want continue and 
increase. 

Moreover, it is extremely important that an 
archbishop, an apostolical legate, should be es- 
tablished at Athens, more worthily to represent 
religion in the capital, as the Metropolitan of the 
kingdom. It is a want of consistency, and even 
of propriety, that Athens, the seat of govern- 
ment, and the residence of foreign ministers, has 
only a simple cure. For this important see a man 
of intelligence would be required, on account 
of his relations to the State and communica- 
tions with other bishops. Athens would thus 
become a centre of religious activity. The Abbe 
Marin elli would greatly desire, on an infinite 
number of religious and political considerations, 
that the future archbishop of Athens should be 
a Frenchman. 

At our interview we devoted much time to 
the great question of the reunion of the Greek 
church. The Abbe Marinelli is one of the 
Greek Catholic clergymen who, by his long 
studies, his ardent desire for the reconciliation 
to Rome of Greece, which he calls "his dear 
country," his knowledge of our language, and 
his high standing among the clergy, may have 
the happiest influence in this weighty question 
of the reconciliation of Christian churches, the 



GREEK FANATICISM. 



241 



preliminaries of which 1 have endeavoured to 
prepare. I do not doubt but that Providence, 
who holds its instruments ready for its own 
time, has placed this pious and learned theolo- 
gian in one of the islands of the Archipelago, 
as an advanced guard of Catholicism, or rather 
as a skilful and powerful mediator between the 
religious world of the West and the great 
Eastern families which are now separated from 
unity. 

I noticed that, in speaking to me of the non- 
Catholic Greeks, he never used any of those 
painful expressions with which my ears had been 
so often wearied whenever I have had to discuss 
the question of reunion with those who were 
of the West, who take contempt and injury for 
orthodoxy and zeal. He frequently called the 
Greeks " our separated brethren." 

The Greeks are very fanatical because they 
are generally ignorant on religious subjects. 
This fanaticism urges them to hate us terribly. 
To bring them nearer to us their ignorance must 
be dispelled, and thus their fanaticism. To 
attain this end, books written with great mode- 
ration should be distributed in Greece, — again 
appeal for the holy religious brotherhood of 
Christianity, rather than an instigation to irri- 
tating controversies. Besides these books, it 
would be important to establish a religious 



242 



THE PROPOSED COUNCIL, 



paper, written in Greek, and aiming, day by 
day, with calmness and extreme prudence, to 
strike men's minds, bring them to meditate 
seriously upon the great question of reunion, 
and, at last, to make that question popular. 

In the second place, a more friendly and 
fraternal intercourse between the Catholic and 
Greek clergy, would be necessary, to remove the 
prejudices of the latter by the knowledge, 
wishes, conciliation, and charity of the former. 
These are the very words of the Abbe Marinelli. 

The oecumenical council would, at last, be 
necessary, the results of which w T ould be incal- 
culable for the reconciliation of Greece. 

And these means, in the opinion of my pious 
friends, ought to be employed without delay, 
now the monarch is a Catholic, and would, 
consequently, offer no obstacle, personally, to 
the reunion ; and now Russia no longer governs 
men's minds exclusively in Greece. 

It is time to begin promptly and energetically 
to apply these powerful means, the realization 
of which can alone save the Church from a 
dreadful future. In his opinion, the execution 
of the plan could not possibly be too greatly 
accelerated. 

At a time when the Greek church is not 
united, or organizing itself, it is important to 
take prompt and efficacious measures. Since 



NECESSITY OF ACTION. 



243 



our interview, the Abbe Marinelli has, in his 
letters to me, always held the same tone.* 

* He lately wrote to me upon this subject, as follows : — 

" My dear and excellent friend, 

" I have just received your letter of the 18th June. 
Continue, my dear brother, with courage and confidence, the 
great work that Providence has laid upon you. For my own 
part, although I am thoroughly convinced of my extreme 
inability to do any good, yet I devote myself with all my 
courage and religious zeal, and with all my might, to help 
you in all matters in which you think my assistance useful. 
I devote myself sincerely and entirely to the holy work of 
the Catholic civilization of my beloved country, and of the 
whole East ; and the happy reconciliation of my separatist 
brothers to their former, only, and true mother, the holy 
Roman-catholic church. 

" Above all, do not lose sight of the grand idea of the 
(Ecumenical Council. It will give rise to an infinite number 
of precious results for the reformation of all things, and 
the general reconciliation of men's minds to the centre of 
Catholic unity. Interest in this great measure as many 
intelligent and pious persons, and men in high station, as 
you can. Make it palatable, by all possible means, to the 
French episcopate. France will always be the foremost in 
great projects on behalf of Catholicism. Spare no pains 
heartily to bring it about by the intervention of the bishops 
before the Sacred College, and through it before the Holy 
Father — a great spirit given to the world for great things — 
a revered head, given to the church for the accomplishment 
of gigantic events. Let its accomplishment be hastened by 
the fervent prayers of pious souls. Let us commend it to 
the Father of Mercies in the unbloody sacrifice of human 
reconciliation. Let us not forget to commend it also to 
that Virgin Mother of the Almighty One, ' quae sola cunctas 
hsereses interemit universo mundo.' Let us write and speak 
often of this great work. Let us end by making it familiar 

R 2 



244 



NECESSITY FOR ACTION. 



He has not concealed from me the need of 
expedition. The creation of numerous bishops 
is a formidable measure, which will, in my 
opinion, either hasten or delay the desired recon- 
ciliation. Grounds for hope and fear militate 
on both sides. 

From this it appears that while some little 
men in the Catholic countries of the West, waste 
so much paper, and produce such small things, 
in the East there exist noble minds who, from a 
higher point of view, consider the interests and 
religious future of the world. 

It cost me not a little to say farewell to the 

to all catholics ; and let us trust in that great Gk>d, 1 qui 
ouinipotentiam suam parcendo maxime et miserando mani- 
festat ; et attingit a fine usque ad finem, et disponit omnia 
suaviter.' 

" I think, my beloved brother, that I have acquainted you 
with my principles, desires, and views. I am not sufficiently 
master of your language to explain myself more fully. But 
catholics, priests, friends, and brethren, plainly understand 
one another. Let us, then, go boldly forward. 

"Read my letter patiently. I can only stammer out 
French, and I write these lines in great haste. 

" Accept, my dear friend and honoured brother, the assu- 
rances of my deepest affection. 

" Your sincere friend, 

"L'Ajbbe Maeinellt, 
"Professor of Theology, Apostolical Missionary." 

In another letter he added : — 

" I believe that there has been no more favourable epoch 
for this reconciliation than the present." 



WE SET OUT FOR SMYRNA. 



245 



warm-hearted man who had just done me so 
much good, both by the sweet bond of a sacred 
friendship which we solemnly pledged to one 
another, and by the words of authority and 
experience that I obtained from his hps on the 
religious questions of the East. When shall we 
again press one another's hands ? Shall we be 
permitted, after long efforts, to see the holy 
work of reconciliation advancing. It would be 
very delightful for the recluse of Syra, and the 
unpretending French author, to meet, when old 
men, in Jerusalem, at the sessions of the oscume- 
nical council, in which these solemn words 
should be unanimously proclaimed : " There is 
but one flock and one Shepherd in the church of 
Christ." This is not impossible with God. 

I descended in silence the sloping streets of 
Syra. A great soul, vir desideriorum, a noble, 
pure, and disinterested priest, had been given to 
me for a friend ; in him I found an energetic 
and devoted fellow-labourer, who had felt, more 
vividly than I had, an inward revelation of the 
destinies of the Church in our time, and whose 
presentiments and hopes coincided with my most 
ardent desires and most cherished vows. 

The u Mahmoudie" was waiting for us in the 
roads. We set out at the close of day. To- 
morrow we shall awake in the port of Smyrna, 



246' 



WE REACH ASIA, 



and I shall celebrate my birthday by setting 
foot on the soil of Asia. 

November 21. — All travellers have described 
Smyrna, and this work does not aim at being 
a book of travels. The impression experienced 
on entering, for the first time, into a large 
Eastern city like Smyrna, is indefinable. There 
is a sudden contrast between that which has 
been most familiar to us, that which has formed 
the substance of our intellectual and moral life, 
that something which we call our civilization, 
and all that then strikes our sight. When a 
man has a certain habit of observation, he comes 
very easily to the conclusion that, after all, it 
is always man that he has before him; and that, 
after stripping off the dress, whose strangeness 
surprises you, you will find his nature the same 
everywhere. But Oriental civilization has 
features so at variance with our European 
civilization, that the least susceptible minds 
must have some time to recover from the shock 
they receive at the sight of this new world. 

The first thing that offends the mind of a 
European, is the appearance of those white 
spectres, whose countenance, covered with a veil 
of dark gauze, is never visible to him. In the 
streets, above all, in the bazaars, these spectres, 



THE ORIENTAL RACE. 



247 



called women, go and come, formal, silent, 
sometimes singly, sometimes in groups, weary- 
ing the eye with the monotony of their move- 
ments and the uniformity of their dress. This 
brand, imposed by jealousy, shocks at first sight, 
and leaves a painful feeling on the heart. We 
cannot endure such a picture of degradation and 
servitude. For a moment, the reasons of 
climate, of propriety, of old traditions which 
sanction such customs, do not appear to us. 
We judge the East from our own ideas of the 
organization of domestic and public life, and in 
doing so, are quite inconsistent and unjust. I 
have often had fco alter afterwards judgments 
that I had formed from the impression of Euro- 
pean ideas, and to find customs that I had 
charged with barbarism, if not good enough to 
imitate, at least very natural and reasonable. 

It was at Smyrna that I first saw the Oriental 
at his prayers ; it was one of the people, a poor 
Mussulman, a camel-driver, that afforded me 
this touching sight. The hour of prayer had 
been announced from the minarets, and I had 
stopped to look into a large court filled with 
goods. The camels lay down, and ruminated 
in silence. All at once I saw the man take off 
his cloak, spread it out upon the planks of a 
shed where he was at the announcement of 
prayers, and then, without troubling himself in 



248 



SMYRNA, 



the least about the presence of the European 
who followed him with watchful eyes, he began 
to call upon God ; making the customary pros- 
trations, and reciting aloud his prayers. I con- 
fess that this public act of adoration made a 
deep impression upon me. Prayer gives to man 
much greatness ! I saw a man whose occupation 
was hard and whose life was abject, seeking in 
God a mitigation of his pain, and an hour of 
reform for mind and body. 

Smyrna is a kind of transition between cities 
completely Oriental, such as Jerusalem, Damas- 
cus, and the cities of Greece and of the West. 
In spite of the general stamp of Asiatic manners 
which are prevalent there, the city still preserves 
many European habits. We see plainly that it is 
only a rendezvous of commerce, a thoroughfare 
where the East comes continually for its mer- 
cantile affairs. Under this aspect, it has its 
special physiognomy, the relations which com- 
merce has established between people of such 
different civilizations would be an interesting 
study. It is evident that rapidity of inter- 
communication, aided by steam, will make these 
approximations of different races yet more fre- 
quent, and one universal civilization will be the 
ultimate result. Already, in spite of the force 
of habit, which has such great power over the 
mind of man, the impetus is given, and every- 



COOTEXION WITH EUROPE. 



249 



thing indicates that it will not stop. M. Bary, 
a merchant of Smyrna, with whom we had made 
friends in crossing from Trieste to Syra, was 
on his way from Europe on business matters. 
He showed us immense warehouses full of the 
richest silk-stuffs woven with gold, such as the 
East has produced for ages past. After we had 
expressed our admiration of the taste and fine- 
ness of these textures, which we had also ad- 
mired in the bazaars of Smyrna, and which 
some of our party had purchased to give as 
keepsakes, M. Bary informed us that almost 
all these stuffs were made in Europe, particu- 
larly in Switzerland. He himself had just given 
orders for some when we met him ; and he 
found the journey to Europe a very simple 
matter ; no more out of the way than fifty 
years ago the journey to Lyons of a merchant of 
Toulouse or Bordeaux. On our return to 
France, we met at Alexandria the passengers 
from India. Amongst them took on board was a 
young merchant from Calcutta. He was come 
to spend a few days with his family at Mar- 
seilles, meaning afterwards to return imme- 
diately to his business. It is impossible to cal- 
culate the influence of these rapid communica- 
tions upon the religious and social future of the 
world. Men of serious and meditative mind 
see in them, without fear, the first-fruits of the 



250 



THE BEIDGE OF CARAVANS. 



most fertile of all revolutions, because it will be 
slow and peaceful, and its benefits will cost 
humanity neither mourning nor tears. 

No stranger visits Smyrna without going to 
the Bridge of Caravans. On our return from 
the bazaars, after a charming visit to the family 
of M. Bary, where we received for the first 
time the usual civilities of the East, pipes, 
coffee, and glyko, we betook ourselves through 
winding streets to the banks of the Meles, a river 
famous in antiquity for the birth of the divine 
Homer — Melesigenes. The bridge which crosses 
it is the Bridge of Caravans. It is passed by 
caravans without number, coming from all 
parts of Asia, or returning from Smyrna to the 
interior of the country. It is, in reality, a 
curious sight. All who have described it, like 
the painters who have sketched the picture of 
it, have ineffectually adorned their description 
with the most brilliant poetry, or the most 
vivid colours. They have not come up to the 
reality. I shall not make the attempt ; although 
I immensely enjoyed it. And the hours 
which I passed before this strange and animated 
scene have left an indelible impression upon my 
memory ; yet I shrink from such a description 
as my readers might require. There is, in cer- 
tain forms of human activity, as in certain scenes 
of nature, a grandeur before which we have to 



THE RIVER MELES. 



251 



acknowledge the powerlessness of the language 
with which we might attempt to express it ; and 
in this scene, movement, colour, form, — all is 
new, extraordinary, and fascinating. 

Of many things, we say, that they are fine ; 
but in returning from the Bridge of Caravans we 
all had the same impression ; not one of us 
could utter what we wished to say, for we felt 
that the scene, so wondrous to reflect upon, 
would have been imperfectly rendered and 
almost profaned had we only said of it : How 
beautiful ! After I had leisurely contemplated, 
seated in front of the Oriental Cafe, the rendez- 
vous of tourists, — the long files of camels which 
seemed more numerous than ever, and were in 
variegated colours, and grotesque forms ; and 
had quite satisfied myself with the singular 
sight whose strangeness fascinated me, I went 
with M. de Saulcy to the bank of the Mel.es to 
look for shells. There was little water in the 
river ; part of its bed was dry, and a somewhat 
sloping strand, consisting of grayish shingles, 
showed the extent of the river at the time of its 
great floods. I wanted to gather for my herba- 
rium some plants that had lived where the 
greatest of poets was born ; and to connect, 
when in Europe, with these flowers, the remem- 
brance of Troy reduced to ashes, and of Ulysses, 
returned to his country. But we had no time 



252 



HIDEOUS BLACK. 



for botanizing. Everything was dried up where 
we were, we must have gone up the river 
towards the mountain. 

Felicien and I remained for a long time in 
the cafe, studying the attitudes and manners of 
the people in the caravans that were then 
staying there. We partook of some raki. A 
black, tall, and of a free and jovial countenance, 
dressed in the Turkish manner, with an enor- 
mous tarboosh on his head, came in a little 
while after us, perspiring profusely. We saw 
him pass unceremoniously by the various 
groups who were seated in the cafe, and 
place himself at the end of the room By his 
order, a large bottle of wine was brought to 
him, which he emptied at a draught, with a 
great many horse-laughs, and wiping his hideous 
face with his hand. The lookers-on did not 
seem very much astonished at this violation of 
Mahomet's law. The features of this black 
struck me : I took out my sketch-book, and 
while pretending to take notes, I sketched this 
bull-dog face, the vilest I had yet met with. 
His enormous mouth was surrounded with thick 
lips, which projected like large swellings ; his 
nose formed a protuberant mass, which was 
fleshy and rounded, and pierced with two small 
holes. He was a very remarkable specimen of a 
negro. 



ANCIENT MOSAIC. 



253 



On returning, I found in the streets of 
Smyrna a fragment of ancient mosaic, which I 
have brought back to France, as a memorial of 
Ionia, so celebrated in antiquity. 

We are to quit Smyrna. The " Vorwarts " 
will put us on board the " Stainboul," which is 
to land us at Constantinople. 



254 



THE DARDANELLES. 



CHAPTER XI. 

The Dardanelles. — The Bosphorus. — Splendid Prospect. — - 
Constantinople. — The Muezzin. — Galata. — The Arch- 
bishop of Pera and his Clergy. — The Armenians. — The 
Patriarch Salviani. — Pather Ventura. — The Lazarists. — 
Revolt of Aleppo. — Decay of Turkey. — St. Sophia. — 
Present State of the Turks. 

November 23. — We are in the Dardanelles 
betimes. I resume my notes begun on board 
the "Vorwarts," on the voyage from Trieste 
to Syra. Notwithstanding the appearance of 
Asiatic Smyrna, my remembrances and my 
sweetest impressions are still with Greece. 

Greece belongs to the East. It is the first 
stage marked out for the nations living on the 
shores of the Atlantic, when going to visit the 
cradle of the human race. It belongs to the 
East by its sun, its vegetation, and the race 
which inhabits it. Its shore is washed by that 
famous sea, sown as it were, with islands, 
between which it spreads its arms like large 



THE B0SPH0RUS. 



255 



canals, facilitating intercourse between many- 
shores. The true East, where human activity is 
displayed, is not the geographical East, that is, 
Asia, considered as one of the quarters of the 
world. The East, which we have to study from 
a religious point of view, has no great con- 
tinental extent. To form a tolerably clear idea 
of it, we must take the iEgean Sea as a centre, 
and radiate from it ; we shall then have the 
Greek world, whose furthest limits are Sicily, 
Southern Italy called Magna Grsecia, Greece 
properly so called, Turkey in Europe, Asia 
Minor, Syria, Palestine, Arabia, and Egypt. It 
is like an immense vase, the outlines of which 
we can follow. The nations of antiquity made 
this basin the theatre of their history. The 
geography of the intellectual world in the East 
has not changed. 

Hereafter we shall have to study, after we 
have visited the Holy Land, the part that 
Providence allots, in our opinion, to the Greek 
world. We only assert, at present, its intimate 
relations with the East, from which it cannot be 
separated. 

November 24. — We were now off Constanti- 
nople. The sky was dull. The immense city 
was spread out before us like an amphitheatre. 
The domes of the mosques, the airy minarets, 



256 



SPLENDID PROSPECT. 



stood out from the horizon, and on the sea- 
shore, as it were at our feet, was seen the old 
seraglio, with its gardens, kiosks, and eastern 
pomp. My kind friend was full of enthusiasm, 
and called upon me to admire with him the 
mass of palaces and temples, standing out from 
clumps of foliage, and encircled by the sea. 
My heart was cold, and nothing interested me. 
St. Sophia, whitewashed by the Fossati, like an 
old country church which has been restored, 
had no effect in the distance. It alone, how- 
ever, by its memories, with its minarets, lighter 
than the most tapering spires of our cathedrals, 
spoke to my heart. All the rest, even the 
Bosphorus, covered as it was with thousands of 
masts, made but a faint impression upon me. 
My friend was almost angry at my indifference. 
It led him to think that I had exhausted all 
my sensibility in Greece, and that I had left 
my heart at the Parthenon. 

Constantinople has been too much praised. 
Its position upon the Bosphorus is doubtless 
enchanting ; the appearance of the city answers 
to that of the metropolis of a great empire. 
Perhaps, in the time of its glory, under the 
successor of Constantine, it never had the aspect 
of grandeur which its domes and minarets now 
give it ; they form quite a forest of architecture, 
and can be compared only to our cities of the 



CONSTANTINOPLE. 



257 



middle ages, with the numberless spires of their 
churches, their turrets, and the pointed and 
carved gables of their houses. But enough of 
this. 

Do not enter Constantinople : approach not 
this seraglio with gilded kiosks, true work of 
barbarism ; do not look at these mean houses, 
where you meet with no signs of a people 
having life and feeling. The mosques are the 
fine part of Constantinople. Religion amongst 
all nations gives birth to art. The mosques 
that I so much admired are not produced by 
Islamism. Christianity inspired them. The 
Agia-Sophia has been from the time of Omar 
the unvarying type of Moslem edifices. Its 
architects were the same Greeks who had pre- 
served the genius of architecture ; at Jerusalem 
it is striking in the Sakrah. You are almost in 
doubt whether the edifice has not been built 
with fragments of ancient buildings ; but the 
illusion does not last long. The capitals and 
ornamentation of an inferior period are very 
different from the work of the purer ages. 
However, it is always a fine art. 

The only thing which is original in the 
mosques, which belongs to Islamism, and of 
which it has all the honour, is the minaret. 

I am jealous of this for Christianity. How 
beautiful is the minaret. What a fine concep- 

s 



258 THE MUEZZIN. 

tion ! What a pulpit given several times a day 
to human lips to call man to prayer, and to 
chant to him the holy saying, borrowed from 
our sacred books, La A llah al A llah ! There is 
no other God but the Lord ! 

It might be that the sight of the Stylites of 
the East, sublime fools who perched themselves 
upon columns, there to give themselves up to 
contemplation, also doubtless to speak of God 
there to those who came to ask for their prayers 
and counsels, inspired the idea of those slender 
columns, divided into several rows of galleries, 
upon which the chant of the muezzin is uttered 
to the four winds of heaven. 

How poor is the effect of the monotonous 
bells of our cities, and of the country, despite 
their silvery tones, — our chimes of every sort, 
compared with the loud and harmonious voice 
of man. 

When, under a pure sky and a genial climate, 
towards the middle of day, breathing the warm 
air of the East, and all at once, a sound of 
voices answering one another breaks in upon 
the silence, intermingling, succeeding, and har- 
monizing with one another ; you seem to hear 
the music of angels who have been sent upon 
earth to sing to God a hymn of glory, and 
bring the word of peace and of good- will to 
men. 



THEIR ASSOCIATIONS, 



259 



Jerusalem was the only city where the chant 
of the muezzin pained me. There are so many 
Christian recollections there that the Maho- 
metan origin of this beautiful call to prayer 
cannot fail to diminish its charm. But on the 
warm shores of Syria, in the month of Decem- 
ber, at Beyrout, at Sidon, at Acre, this chant 
was always delightful to me and excited feelings 
of religion. 

I sometimes compared the sound of the bells 
which have furnished me with the greatest joys 
of my life, which called so many recollections of 
happiness and sorrow, yet it was useless to try 
and feel a preference for bells ; I came back to 
my former admiration for the voice of man 
from the lofty minaret. One is the sound of 
matter, the other is the utterance of the heart ; 
one is an instrument, the other is a song ; one 
is sonorous metal, the other is the aspiration 
towards God of his intelligent creature. 

I sometimes remembered in the East when I 
was giving up myself to the charms of the muez- 
zin, that in Europe M. Lamartine was charged as 
with a crime for preferring the human voice to 
the sound of bells. Exclusive minds do not 
understand some things. Besides, we must 
make up our minds for like criticisms. He who • 
is forced to think like the vulgar, above all like 
the vulgar who have never gone beyond the 

s 2 



260 



GALATA. 



suburbs of their little town, is much to be pitied. 
In our northern and variable climate, the atmo- 
sphere so often heavy and rainy, the chant of 
man from the top of belfries, inviting the 
faithful to prayer, would be rarely heard; our 
immense squares, our long streets, the noise of 
vehicles and the din of machinery in factories, 
would deprive this chant of its melancholy and 
charm. Bells suit us ; they somewhat drown 
the noise for us who are accustomed to the 
sound of drums, to the rolling of carriages, and 
to shrill cries in our streets. 

In the cities of the East, the air is so calm 
and pure, sound is so quickly transmitted, that 
the loud voice of man can make itself perfectly 
heard. When this religious chant comes upon 
you by surprise, it is impossible not to feel an 
indescribable emotion. The Christian forgets that 
these words issue from the mouth of a Mussul- 
man, and asks himself whether it is not the 
hosts of heaven again announcing the good 
tidings. — "And suddenly there was with the 
angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising 
God." 

The "Stamboul" brings us into the great har- 
bour of Constantinople ; the anchor is dropped ; 
and light caiques land us at the quay in the 
suburb of Galata. In no city in the world is 
there more movement, or more noise, than in 



HARBOUR OF CONSTANTINOPLE. 



261 



this part of Constantinople. There is here an 
indescribable bustle and confusion ; the streets 
are narrow, slippery, and ill-paved ; the impos- 
sibility of passing with carts, forces the people 
to trust the heaviest loads to robust porters. 
Men of all races, and of all languages, clothed 
in dresses of every sort, were elbowing one 
another in these animated streets. You might 
note these various races : Turks, Jews, Greeks, 
Armenians, Franks, English, German, French, 
and Russian travellers pass and repass. You 
are at a general gathering of nations. 

This feature is much more remarkable at 
Constantinople than the city itself. I do not 
deny that the general view is a magnificent 
panorama. There are not two harbours in the 
world like that of Constantinople, nor is there 
any where a more imposing assemblage of 
mosques with graceful domes, pierced with semi- 
circular windows, contrasting their immense 
curves with the lightness of the minarets, which 
stand out from them like a forest of masts. 
Then all this towers, like a pyramid, to the eye, 
and is piled in a kind of disorder which gives to 
these fantastic masses a character of originality 
that would in vain be looked for in the sym- 
metrical lines of our great cities. 

However, the travellers who have given such 
a fascinating description of Constantinople, 



1 



262 THE LOWER EMPIRE. 

visited it at the season when the Eastern sun 
gives the most vivid tints to objects. I saw it 
under a duller sky, and I do not wish to con- 
tradict those who have there, like our Lamartine, 
experienced impressions that no other place, no 
other great city, had ever excited in them. 
After the splendid landscapes in Greece that I 
contemplated with such delight, I was, perhaps, 
difficult to please. Stamboul, with the Bos- 
phorus, was not eloquent to me like the valley 
of Sparta and Taygetus, like Athens and 
Corinth. 

And then, what great event has happened at 
Constantinople ? There the Roman Empire saw 
its decline, Christianity its decay, the Turkish 
race its agony. It is a city with periodical fires 
for its inhabitants and endless misfortunes for its 
princes ; it has only the recollection of departed 
greatness. It only tells you of disputes of 
monks, or revolts of janissaries. It is branded 
with this word — The Lower Empire. Happy 
for it that it has St. Sophia ! 

Christian Constantinople was the particular 
object of my studies. To form a clear idea of 
it, we must trace every nation resident in the 
city. Before entering upon this subject, I ought 
to mention the persons whom I had the honour 
of seeing, and from whom I obtained the greater 
part of my information. On the day after my 



ARCHBISHOP OF PERA. 263 



arrival, I went to call on the Abbe Antonio 
Marinelli, brother of the Abbe Marinelli of 
Syra. I had to give him a very warm letter of 
introduction, on behalf of the new friend who 
was come to him from Europe. His brother 
begged him to give me particular help in my 
researches. The Abbe Antonio Marinelli is a 
missionary priest of the Latin ritual, attached to 
the church of St. Peter at Galata. There is no 
attention that this excellent man did not pay 
me. He placed himself at my disposal, with 
a kindness of which I retain a pleasant recol- 
lection. 

On the same day, I called upon M. Hille- 
reau, archbishop of Pera, and patriarchal vicar 
of the Latins. His house is at the extremity of 
the suburbs of Pera. I passed close by the 
Latin cemetery. T saw there several tombs of 
Frenchmen with Latin inscriptions. The Ma- 
hometans have respected the cross, which is also 
engraven upon these tombstones. The cemetery 
is not inclosed any more than those of the 
Turks. In the East, the cemeteries are large 
fields, which you may enter, on all sides, without 
meeting with walls or barriers. At Smyrna 
and Constantinople they are planted with 
cypresses that grow as tall as our poplars in Eu- 
rope. These forests of perpetual verdure, which 
indicate the site of a modern Necropolis, produce 



264 



MONS. HILLEREAU. 



around great cities, and often in the very centre 
of the suburbs, a remarkable effect. Mussulmen 
never shun them, and seem to pass through 
them without experiencing those terrors to 
which we are accustomed from our childhood, 
and of which our riper years are divested with 
great difficulty. 

M. the patriarchal vicar received me with 
extraordinary kindness. In him I found a 
man of superior mind, who perfectly under- 
stood the religious question, and who spoke 
to me upon it at length, and with remarkable 
impartiality and great judiciousness. Among 
the difficulties in the way of bringing together 
an oecumenical council, M. Hillereau places that 
of making the Greeks come to it. They would 
not like to displease the Emperor of Russia, 
whose co-religionists they are. In case the oecu- 
menical council were convened in any city of 
the East of Europe, he would convene one in 
his own dominions, and oppose the orthodox 
Greek church to the Catholic church, which 
would render the schism still more violent. 
He owned, however, that this difficulty ought 
not to stop the projected council : that several 
circumstances might arise and render the oppo- 
sition of Russia less violent than is commonly 
supposed. 

M. the vicar patriarchal has with him a 



THE ABBE DUNAVIT. 



265 



cousin, the Abbe Hillereau, a man of equal 
ability, who probably is his vicar-general and 
secretary. He has no episcopal council. 

The following day, I found at the house of 
the Abbe Antonio Marinelli, the Abbe Georges 
Dunavit, chaplain of the Island of Princes. He 
is also a Greek of the Latin ritual. He is an 
intelligent man, and of superior views. He 
speaks French very well. I gave him a letter 
of introduction, that Colonel Touret of Athens 
had given me. He accompanied me with Abbe 
Antonio Marinelli to the house of M. Has- 
soun, archbishop and primate of the Catholic 
Armenians. 

M. Hassoun is an Armenian from Constan- 
tinople. He is rich from family property and 
from the revenues of his office. His appearance is 
mild and noble. It is difficult for me to express 
with what great cordiality I was received by 
him. Our conversation lasted upwards of an 
hour; M. Hassoun kept it up in an easy and 
charming manner. He understands French, 
but as he does not speak it so easily as Italian, 
it was agreed that he should answer me in the 
the latter language. He had recently been at 
Rome, and I found him acquainted with all the 
important religious matters of Europe. 

We discussed at length the great question of 
the oecumenical council. I saw that he fully 



266 



THE ARMENIANS. 



understood its importance. He told me that he 
attached immense importance to the council, 
and that it would be a great blessing to Christi- 
anity could this project be realized. I was 
struck with the sound sense of all that he said 
to me, and with the amiable ease with which he 
sustained the conversation. 

He had been elected, about six or seven years 
ago, by the Armenian nation, as their spiritual 
and temporal chief, with the title of Patriarch. 
But the Propaganda of Pome did not authorize 
him to take the title officially, although it is 
always given to him. The Propaganda was per- 
fectly right in this. We must not multiply in 
the East these titles, which will only create 
greater difficulties in the case of a union of the 
non-Catholic part of the Armenian nation. 
- It is some time since he resigned his office 
as temporal chief. The person elected in his 
place, who takes the title of civil patriarch, is a 
simple priest, with no hierarchical station. Com- 
monly the Porte does not allow the temporal 
chiefs of different nations to be laymen. 

In his desire to advance religion among the 
Armenian Catholics, M. Hassoun had appointed, 
from his most able priests, six bishops for the 
most important dioceses of the Catholic patri- 
archate, in which up to this time there had been 
only simple vicarial administrators. He had 



THE PATRIARCH SALVIANI. 267 



consulted upon this point the Propaganda of 
Rome, who approved his project and greatly- 
applauded his zeal ; but Rome and the worthy 
prelate had not foreseen that these bishops would 
experience from the dioceses to which they were 
appointed, so insurmountable an opposition, that 
they have been forced to renounce the thought 
of establishing themselves there. The Catholic 
population of Armenia has contested M. Has- 
soun's right to impose bishops upon them with- 
out consulting them, and without the persons 
being submitted to their election according to 
canonical rules. From this it results that the 
step of the patriarchal vicar was a grave mis- 
take ; at Rome, where ideas of election receive 
little favour, the difficulty was not suspected. 
He is positive that it was not so great as to 
prevent him from trying to overcome the oppo- 
sition of the nation and its clergy. 

I went afterwards, with the Abbe Dunavit, 
to call upon the civil patriarch of the Armenian 
Catholics. His name is Salviani. He as well 
as M. Hassoun, honoured us with coffee. He 
conversed a very long while with me, with that 
excellent and noble oriental familiarity which 
does not lower a man's dignity. 

He confirmed the greater part of the accounts 
that I had already received, and furnished me 
with others of great interest. He thinks there 



268 



FATHER VENTURA. 



will be no difficulties in the way of a reunion 
of the Armenian nation, but that obstacles 
would come from the Greeks. He is persuaded 
that only an oecumenical council can bring about 
the reunion. He cited, as a case in point, the 
failure of the steps taken by Pius IX at the 
commencement of his pontificate. His Holiness 
had sent to court, in the month of Nov. 1847, 
M. Ferrieri, archbishop of Sidon in partibus, 
in the quality of apostolical nuncio and visitor- 
general of the East . The nuncio was the bearer 
of an encyclical letter from the Holy Father, 
in which he most earnestly entreated the 
Christians of the East to return to the Roman 
church. This noble step of the pious pontiff 
was generally attributed to the influence of 
Father Ventura. The Armenian patriarch re- 
ceived the nuncio of the Pope in a friendly 
manner, and politely accepted the encyclical 
letter ; but, at his first visit, he did not touch 
upon the great affair. A second visit was to 
be made, but the Armenian patriarch refused 
to see them. The Greek patriarch received the 
nuncio with coldness : he took the encyclical 
letter, and after his departure threw it into the 
fire, in the presence of his bishops and priests. 

The patriarch Salviani wears a violet coloured 
silk calotte. He was dressed in an ample violet 
coloured robe, fastened by a girdle of soft stuf£ 



THE LAZAR1STS. 



269 



and over this a violet coloured pelisse, edged 
with a little fur. He has a long beard, like all 
the priests in the East, without exception, to 
whatever communion they belong. He is a 
man about fifty years old ; he w 7 as for a long 
time a missionary in Armenia, and adminis- 
trator of a diocese. On our entry, he rose 
from a divan on which he was sitting. He was 
reading the allocution of Pius IX, in the last 
consistory, on the affairs of Sardinia. He 
walked up to me, and gave me his hand. The 
kind, simple, and gentle manners of these men 
of the East, singularly contrast with French 
gravity, which makes us take stiffness for 
dignity, and cold reserve for grandeur. One 
feels at ease with such men. 

Before going to the house of the Patriarch 
Salviani, T had called upon the excellent 
Lazarists of Galata. They welcomed me very 
warmly. One of their missionaries who had 
been in Palestine, and had passed through the 
whole country from Egypt to Jerusalem, pre- 
dicted that I should leave my bones in the 
desert if I ventured there. He was stopped by 
the Bedouins, although his caravan consisted 
of nearly three hundred persons, and without 
his intervention with the Arabs, who respected 
his person as a priest, they would all have been 
murdered. This account, accompanied with 



270 



GREEK DISHONESTY. 



very pressing and kind entreaties not to expose 
myself to such dangers, gave me not the least 
anxiety. The Superior of the Lazarists was 5 at 
that time, in France ; but his temporary suc- 
cessor was full of kindness to me. His conver- 
sation greatly interested me. Like all the mis- 
sionaries and monks that I had seen in the East, 
he gave me a very high character of the Turks. 
M. de Lamartine has been much found fault 
with for giving them such a character ; it related 
chiefly to their honesty and fidelity to their 
word. The promise of a Turk is sacred : he 
would not break it for all the world. 

He gave a very different account of the 
Greeks. A Greek will give you his signature, 
a mortgage, everything that you ask for : yet he 
will find a way to shuffle and to cheat you if he 
can. Generally speaking, I have found every- 
where, but chiefly at J erusalem, this traditional 
hatred of the Greeks. The misfortunes which 
the historians of the Crusades have attributed 
to them, are well known. As an impartial 
judge in the matter, I must say that I have 
found these complaints against the Greeks very 
exaggerated. I have found them nearly always 
springing from religious rivalry, which hardly 
knows how to hold the balance. 

I learnt from the Lazarist missionary, that 
when Mahomet Ali, after having taken posses- 



REVOLT OF ALEPPO. 



271 



sion of Syria, advanced towards Constantinople, 
lie had a good chance of being well received 
there. The old party was in his favour. His 
zeal for the Mussulman faith was talked of * 
and from hatred of reform, men were ready to 
admit him into Constantinople. After the 
reform began, it met with an incredible opposi- 
tion from religious ideas. The men who sup- 
ported it have to fight against their own con- 
victions, at least against all the prejudices of 
their education and blood. Will they have the 
courage ever to fight ? Some young Turks who 
were coming from Europe, and with whom I 
conversed sometimes on board the " Stamboul," 
told me that the ulema (Turkish doctors) were 
very powerful at Constantinople, that there 
were nearly seven hundred in that city, and 
that their influence neutralized the countenance 
of men in power, and delayed the progress of 
the Turkish nation towards civilization. The 
Turks were dressed quite like Europeans ; spoke 
very good French, and apart from that distinc- 
tive character of nonchalance and effeminacy 
which is seen in the modern Turk, it would have 
been difficult to recognize in them the sons of 
the old Osmanlis. 

The revolt of Aleppo was then making a 
great noise. It was generally attributed to 
religious fanaticism. The conscription had been 



272 



DECAY OF TURKEY. 



the pretext for it, but the true motive was oppo- 
sition to reform. 

Will the Turkish nation ever rise from its 
profound decay ? 

A hundred times I put this question to my- 
self during my travels. And I always solved 
it in this way : the Turkish Empire, as at pre- 
sent constituted, cannot be maintained. This 
long corpse, the emaciated limbs of which 
stretch from the Bosphorus to the sands of 
Arabia, is at its last gasp. Its agony may be 
prolonged ; but it can never rise again with 
vigorous life. There are whole provinces be- 
longing to this empire only in name. Such is 
Syria. The Arab race is dominant there ; and 
whenever it is minded to establish its indepen- 
dence, it had only to give a signal. It will not 
require, like unhappy Greece, a violent and 
desperate struggle. 

All the intelligent men that we met in our 
travels, Englishmen, Russians and others, carry 
from the East the same conviction. The Turkish 
people is now arrived at impotency. 

As an upright and peaceful race they deserve 
our interest. We see that they try to do right. 
They are not wanting in good intentions, but 
in activity and energy. The look of the Turk is 
mild ? and his lips soon fall into a smile. He is 
silent, like a man of no ambition, no care about 



A courier's HONESTY. 



273 



the future. He is a lover of justice, and an 
observer of hospitality, like all Mussulmans. His 
trustworthiness is remarkable. In the great 
cities of the East, as Smyrna and Constanti- 
nople, all the porters are Turks. The keys of 
warehouses into which they go and come at all 
hours, are intrusted to them ; and they have 
never been known to betray this confidence. 

A trait of Turkish simplicity was related in my 
presence. A Turkish courier, the bearer of bills 
to a considerable amount, was stopped by robbers. 
These they took, and left the Turk to continue 
his journey. After a little reflection, the good 
man went back, and in despair cried out : " Stop, 
here is all my own money, take it, but give me 
back that of which I was the bearer ; it does not 
belong to me." The robbers laughed a good 
deal, and added to the money they had already 
taken, that also which was so kindly offered to 
them. When they were afterwards arrested, 
they themselves related the adventure. 

The prejudices of childhood have always repre- 
sented the Turks to us as ferocious beings. I 
was much surprised to find them everywhere 
the most peaceable of men. I have seen them 
the same at Constantinople, Beyrout, and J eru- 
salem. The Turkish soldier walks quietly in 
the streets, as uncomfortable in his uniform as 
one of our recruits dressed for duty ; you never 

T 



274 



MUSSULMAN SOLDIERS. 



hear from these men any cry or quarrelling : 
they never offer you an offensive word, or a 
malevolent look. I compared them in the 
streets of Jerusalem to good seminarists, observ- 
ing the rules of clerical modesty. I only once 
saw a Turk overcome with wine. He went 
down the Via Dolorosa to his barrack, which 
was also the Pacha's house. He addressed some 
words in Italian to me which I did not listen .to. 
This man who thus acted like a European, by 
breaking the laws of his religion, had probably 
been a sailor living in some sea-port. At Con- 
stantinople I went regularly every day, and 
spent a long time at St. Sophia ; I measured 
parts of the building, and drew their details. 
The passers-by, the soldiers, even some of the 
officers of guard at the old seraglio, frequently 
formed a group round me, addressed some word 
to me which I did not understand, but which 
I considered very complimentary; they asked 
to see the different sketches that I had made. 
Then smiling like children, they struck me 
gently upon the shoulder as a mark of friend- 
ship, when I uttered the only word of their 
language that I understood, — I am a French- 
man. 

During my examination of St. Sophia, not- 
withstanding the imprudence of this step, I 
several times entered the courts of the mosque, 



ST. SOPHIA. 



275 



and twice penetrated into the interior. I doubly 
wounded their religious customs, because I kept 
my shoes on my feet, and my dress plainly told 
that I was a Christian. They obliged me to 
withdraw, but with no violence, as I had ex- 
pected. I did not understand the sign that the 
keeper of the mosque made to me. He showed 
me the palm of his hand, meaning by this sign : 
" Have you a firman from the Grand Signor V 
I could easily have slipped some piastres into 
his hand, and he would have let me longer 
admire that marvellous cupola, the remembrance 
alone of which is delightful. 

The Turks are a people in their second child- 
hood ; they want to grow up again, and again 
arrive at maturity. But they must sink under 
the burden of an empire too heavy for their 
feeble shoulders. The Turkish nation requires 
the peaceable possession of the countries in Asia 
Minor, where it is now dominant ; but Armenia, 
Syria, Arabia, the islands of the Archipelago, 
and Turkey in Europe, should be declared inde- 
pendent, either with a native government, or 
under the protectorate of the great powers of 
Europe. It is absurd in diplomatists obstinately 
to prolong the seat of the Turks at Constanti- 
nople. They thus sacrifice even the true interests 
of this honest people. Give them, as Lamartine 
has poetically said, brooks and flowers ; consign 

T 2 



276 



STATE OF THE TURKS. 



them to a rustic life ; but release them from the 
political part that you make them play, by 
keeping them, against all their own instincts, 
in the great civilized family of Europe, which 
they cordially detest, because they attribute to 
us their degradation. Besides, they understand 
nothing of the movement which carries us for- 
ward, and in which they find themselves out of 
place. It is the honest cottager in the luxurious 
drawing-room of a great man : he makes but a 
sorry figure, and is very uncomfortable there. 



THE ARMENIANS. 



277 



CHAPTER XII. 

The Armenians. — M. Tchamourdjan. — Council of Florence. 
— The Procession of the Son. — Catholic Doctrine. — The 
Armenian College. — Scutari. — The Bosphorus. — The 
Caiques. — The Greek Patriarch. — Intriguing Spirit. — 
Theological Studies. — Catholic Priests. — Eeligious Dis- 
sensions. — Visit to St. Sophia. — The great Porch. — 
Porphyry Columns. — Ancient Mosaics. 

November 28. — The Abbe Dunavit pointed 
out to me among the Armenians whom he knew 
at Constantinople, one of the most remarkable 
men of the East, — M. Jean de Brousse Tcha- 
mourdjan. He is the most able layman in the 
Armenian nation. He lives at Scutari, near the 
Armenian college. He is not a Catholic. 

We were received in a large room, the only 
furniture of which was a divan somewhat raised 
from the floor, whereon the learned Armenian 
was sitting, having in front of him a small low 
writing table. He was surrounded with books 
and newspapers. I found in him a man equal 
in knowledge to the most distinguished men of 



278 M0NS. TCHAMOURDJAN. 

Europe. He shared nearly all my thoughts on 
the reunion of Christian communions. With 
the modesty of men who know much, and think 
they know little, he began, at my request, to 
give me the information that I expected from 
one so distinguished, and occupying so high a 
place in the esteem of his nation. I noted down 
from his dictation, for upwards of an hour, the 
valuable information that he was good enough 
to furnish me with. Coffee and Turkish pre- 
serves had been served on our arrival by his son, 
a fine young man, eighteen years of age, who in 
accordance with ancient manners, stood respect- 
fully near his father, and from time to time, on 
receiving an order from him, went to the library 
to fetch the books required for the notes given 
to me. 

M. Tchamourdjan is quite convinced that 
reunion with the Catholics will not meet with 
the least difficulty from the entire Armenian 
nation. But he does not think it can take 
place without the eclat of an oecumenical coun- 
cil. In the East many are kept away from 
Catholicism by thinking that Rome wishes to 
acquire for itself all the power of the Church, 
without respecting the councils for which Chris- 
tians of all communions profess a veneration 
equal to that for the Holy Gospels. The mission 
entrusted to the nuncio of His Holiness to the 



SUPPOSED RIVALRY. 



279 



patriarchate of the East, would have been more 
successful had it been stated that the pious pon- 
tiff proposed to offer to the church of the East a 
Catholic representative assembly, to which the 
bishops of the entire world were to discuss with 
it the great affair of reconciliation. The 
Orientals, especially the clergy of the higher 
orders, always see in the Pope the patriarch of 
the West. They seem to have to treat as equals 
with equals. The rivalry of the sees is too 
much before their mind ; they have the misfor- 
tune to consider that a personal humiliation, a 
cession of their rights, and a renunciation of 
the glorious privileges of the patriarchate which 
they belong to is suffered by an accept- 
ance of the supremacy of the Pope. In an 
oecumenical council, in the midst of their brother 
bishops, assembled from all parts of Christen- 
dom, where the papacy, represented by dele- 
gates, would no longer appear as itself the 
church, but as it is by its Divine institution, the 
head of the body of which the episcopate forms 
the members, the bishops of the East would 
find no clashing in the religious discussions 
in which they might take part. They would be 
then with the hierarchial rank given to them by 
the canons. The happy effect produced upon 
the Orientals by the honours shown at Ferrara 
to the patriarch of Constantinople, is yet re- 



280 



COUNCIL OF FLORENCE. 



membered. Pope Eugenius treated him with 
great distinction. The Greek patriarch was ex- 
tremely sensible of the respectful behaviour of 
the Latins ; and the impression he received of 
it contributed not a little to dispose his mind to 
the reunion which was proclaimed in the council 
of Florence. 

On the other hand, the points in discussion 
between the two churches would be treated with 
more care, ripeness, and interest, in the long 
conferences of an assembly, than in a dry written 
exposition. A book can be answered, good or 
bad, with some texts ; and by a little scholastic 
subtilty, we can get out of it. At the great 
and serious struggles of a council, tricks of the 
pen are of little use. There men must speak 
plainly, and state precisely the teaching of the 
fathers, and the traditions of the church. After 
some time, the powerful current of Catholic 
feeling would be established between these men, 
and cause on all sides great admissions, which 
are almost irresistible, when men of sound judg- 
ment throw a flood of light upon truths which, 
up to that time, were imperfectly explained. 

Of this we have a most striking example in 
the contests of this council of Florence. 

The chief question between the Eastern and 
Latin churches was the addition of " filioque " 
to the Nicene Creed ; the denial of the Eastern 



THE PROCESSION OF THE SON. 281 

church that the Spirit proceeds from the Son. 
The discussion was long, and occupied a con- 
siderable number of sittings; but it was carried 
on with a force, clearness, and method which 
would, perhaps, be difficult to find in a council 
in our day. The Latin theologians held, — and 
on this point they had numberless testimonies 
from Holy Scripture and the fathers of the two 
churches,- — that the Holy Spirit proceeds from 
the Son as well as from the Father. 

The Eastern doctors held that there were not 
two causes, — two principles, — of the Holy Spirit; 
(a doctrine which they believed was taught by 
the Latins) ; but one and the same spiration. 

The Latins feared that the Son was not made 
a cause and principle as well as the Father; the 
Greeks feared that two principles were given to 
the Holy Spirit, and this would have destroyed 
the unity in the Divine Trinity. 

Now the question was admirably cleared up in 
the council ; and it was admitted by the Latins 
that the Holy Spirit, which proceeds from the 
Son as well as from the Father, is one Spirit. 

So that it would be heresy to say that the 
Son has a distinct spirit from the spirit of the 
Father, a proposition which was abhorrent to 
the Greeks, and which they formally rejected; 
and so that it would be another heresy to say 
that the Son has not the spirit of the Father, — 



282 



THE CATHOLIC DOCTRINE. 



a point, which the Latins reproached the Greeks 
with believing, when they rejected the "filioque 
procedit" of the Creed. 

The Catholic doctrine brought out by this 
discussion was this: the Holy Spirit proceeds 
from the Father and the Son ; this is the opinion 
of the Latins * — but it is the Spirit of the Father 
which proceeds through the Son; this is what 
the Greeks meant. 

M. Tchamourdjan may, perhaps, be regarded 
as the true representative of the Armenian 
nation not in unity. He has studied its spirit. 
He is the principal editor of the Armenian 
journal published at Constantinople ; and we 
know the action of the periodical press upon a 
people in the condition of the Armenians. I 
ought to mention those conditions, as I under- 
stand them, notwithstanding M. Tchamourdjan's 
extreme prudence on this point. 

Before the charter of emancipation given to 
the non-Mussulman subjects of the Turkish 
empire, the Armenians had, like all other Christ- 
ians, a precarious position at Constantinojjle. 
It was only by skill, and patience, and even 
deceit, that the nation somewhat supported itself. 
It is true it had in hand a powerful lever, which 
was turned to account in weighty circumstances, 
but it was always at a great sacrifice. This 
lever is gold; and we know what this will do in 



THE ARMENIANS. 



283 



the East. The charter of emancipation has re- 
markably raised the Armenian nation, and has 
prepared for it a marked preponderance in the 
future. The larger fortunes of the empire are 
in their hands : the Armenians are the financiers, 
the capitalists, the richest and most able mer- 
chants of Constantinople. 

But separation from Rome deprives the nation 
of powerful support. The Armenians are, like 
the Jews, a nation by themselves; a large family, 
which is perpetuated, and continues to increase, 
by a tenacious spirit of nationality and indomi- 
table perseverance ; but there are only a million 
and a half in the empire. The schism keeps 
them weak, and restricted to their own resources. 
Men of intelligence among them (and of them 
there are a considerable number) do not dis- 
semble what influence they would obtain in a 
little time if their union with the West took 
place. The religious movement would favour 
the commercial; their political influence would 
be increased by the impulse the nation would 
receive from participating in the great work 
now carried on in the heart of the West. Open, 
so to say, to France, as a friend, it would ac- 
quire, by intercourse with us, that spirit of 
enterprise in which they are now deficient ; it 
would begin, perhaps, very soon a system of 
political emancipation, in which its nationality 



284 



THE ARMENIANS. 



would be acknowledged; and its limits upon the 
map of native peoples be marked out, were the 
Turkish empire to come all at once to complete 
destruction. The support, the protection, the 
sympathies of France, would reach them as 
naturally as the Libaneots, whose independence, 
in the heart of their mountains, we have main- 
tained by a skilful and honourable system. 

The Armenians understand all this; they 
come likewise naturally to us : they have col- 
leges in Europe, where their young men acquire 
our manners, ideas, and civilization. The Meki- 
tarists, who are at the head of them, form a 
religious society, having the twofold happiness 
of being strongly attached to the political and 
religious nationality of their country, and of 
understanding, even temporally, all the advan- 
tage of union with the church of the West. 
They are weU-mfornied men, and know that 
religious differences are not a great obstacle, 
now that they will be opposed by great inte- 
rests ; and that even self-love will be in favour 
of a reconciliation. 

It will be seen, then, that as often as I have 
had to confer with Armenians, whether the 
superior clergy or influential laynien, I have 
only met with favour. 

It would be sad not to know how to obtain 
some good from such providential circumstances. 



THEIR COLLEGE. 



285 



The Catholic Armenians are already very nu- 
merous. At Constantinople they amount to 
twenty thousand, and about seventy thousand 
are spread throughout the empire, particularly 
in Asia Minor. 

I particularly remarked the kind and warm 
welcome that the Armenians not in union give 
to Catholics. Not to speak of myself, I saw 
some religious Mekitarists received, with every 
kind of respect, at the college of Scutari, when 
I visited it with M. Tchamourdjan. He himself 
proposed to me to visit this fine establishment, 
of which he was Professor. It appeared that 
the elders of the nation feared his influence, and 
suspected his liberal opinions. He no longer 
fills any chair there. The young Armenians 
are in a large hall, clean and airy, where they 
have a desk which holds their books, and is 
used also as a closet, upon which they work. 
Their beds are on one side. I was struck with 
the type of their countenance ; they are all alike ; 
one would say they were brothers. A round 
face, common-place but mild features, large and 
open eyes, a mouth indicating good nature; 
these are the characteristics of this race in youth ; 
but it seemed to me to lack energy and enterprize. 
The people of the East are like the palm-tree ; 
they want the hand of Providence to take thither 
the men of the West, and give them the fertility 



286 



SCUTARI. 



of intelligence. The two Armenian Mekitarist 
priests that I saw at the college of Scutari were 
from Vienna, where they have a convent. They 
wear the dress of Armenian priests, excepting 
the black cap covered with a veil; they have 
adopted the broad-brimmed hat, turned up a 
little at the sides. They were to leave on the 
third day after, at the same time as ourselves, 
for Smyrna. Their manners were easy ; and 
their whole appearance was very imposing. The 
priest, more than any one else, needs to travel. 

Before leaving us, M. Tchamourdjan and I 
promised mutually a strong and lasting friend- 
ship. He kindly offered to correspond with me 
upon the great question of the reunion of the 
Armenian nation. He has kept his word ; and 
the favourable disposition which he showed me 
when I had the pleasure of seeing him has not 
changed. 

If the oecumenical council were convoked for 
a rather distant period, — for instance, in ten to 
fifteen years' time, — M. Tchamourdjan would 
labour strenuously to prepare the preliminaries 
of the reconciliation. He has all the breadth 
of mind necessary for such a task, and the par- 
ticular tact which such an important mediation 
needs. Providence selects its men. 

Scutari is a city which does not strike the 
eye by any remarkable feature. We visited the 



THE B0SPH0RUS. 



287 



great mosque, which is not an ancient edifice. 
St. Sophia is the type of all Mussulman churches; 
they owe all their majesty to this noble and 
judicious imitation. Intercourse with Europeans 
has made the Turks of Constantinople more 
tolerant than those of the other cities of the 
empire. The Abbe Dunavit, who accompanied 
me, wore his ecclesiastical dress ; I was dressed 
as a European : yet we were allowed to cross 
the inclosure of the mosque, and we remained 
at the principal entrance long enough to inspect 
the interior. I did not observe the smallest 
sign of dissatisfaction on the part of the Mussul- 
men who happened to be there. 

I crossed the Bosphorus in the same caique 
in which I had come there. The sea was rough; 
the current frightfully rapid. Every moment 
the furious waves covered us with spray, and 
threatened to engulf us. We were sometimes 
obliged to give way to the current, which carried 
us towards the old seraglio. Nothing is more 
curious than these little barks, the prow of 
which is as sharp as the edge of an axe, and 
which, being slender and light, cut the waves 
with inexpressible swiftness. The two rowers, 
with regular strokes, struck the water with their 
light oars. They had on only a pair of linen 
drawers with large folds, a white shirt made of 
transparent gauze, the falling sleeves of which, 



288 



THE CAIQUES. 



like the bas-reliefs of the twelfth century, were 
ornamented with festoons. The red fez covered 
their head. They did not wear the long eastern 
beard, but simple moustaches ; their faces were 
reeking with perspiration. These caiques, with 
sharp and lofty prows, on whose inner sides are 
sculptured little garlands of leaves and flowers ; 
these sailors, in such a charming costume, seemed 
to me like pictures of a past time, that we love 
to realise as fancy evermore surrounded with 
poetry, and which then, by their actual exam- 
ples, corresponded with the picture I had formed 
of it. These boats are exquisitely clean. The 
Turks, who always wear double shoes, take off 
those which have touched the mud, and lay them 
at the farther end of the boat : they then enter, 
and seat themselves on a carpet at the bottom 
of the boat. Unhappily these charming craft, 
which are so light that two strong men might 
carry them upon their shoulders, require some 
precautions on going on board. They easily 
upset ; and when the current of the Bosphorus 
is very rapid, they run the risk of foundering. 
I had myself some experience of this, and I 
was obliged to command the rowers, — who are 
ever imprudent because familiar with the danger, 
— to slacken their speed, and to get out of the 
current by degrees, to reach the part of the 
Bosphorus which is sheltered by the hill of 



THE GREEK PATRIARCH. 



289 



Galata. I ^was told, however, that accidents 
were rare ; people always consult the state of 
the sea before taking the caiques. 

I continued at Constantinople my inquiries 
upon the religious question. 

The Christian population of Constantinople 
is considerable. The Greeks, not in union, are 
about 100,000 ; the Armenians, not in union, 
about 80,000 ; the Latins, 12,000. As there is 
no regular official census of the population of 
the Ottoman Empire, the numbers obtained are 
not always very precise. Thus, I was told by 
some persons, that there were a million and 
a half Armenians in the empire, whilst others 
raised the number to three millions. 

The Greek patriarch is named Anthimos ; he 
was about seventy years of age. He is an able 
man ; he takes the title of oecumenical patriarch 
of the great church of Constantinople. He is 
the head of the synod, which consists of twelve 
members. These members are archbishops in 
partibus, whose dioceses are governed by vicar- 
bishops, called archimandrites. Each diocese 
has the right of sending two pupils to the 
seminary in the Princes's Island at Constanti- 
nople — the ancient Calcis. This seminary is 
kept up at the expense of the bishops. 

There is some property belonging to the 
Greek churches, of which the bishops have the 

D 



290 



ECCLESIASTICAL REVENUES. 



usufruct. Each parish also makes an annual 
collection for the bishops. Four or five laymen, 
forming a commission, go to every house with 
a register, and receive the offerings of the faith- 
ful. The collection in the churches on Good 
Friday is applied to the same purpose. 

There are some bishops whose revenues are 
considerable. A bishop of Macedonia was men- 
tioned to me, who has a million piastres (250,000 
francs) : the archbishop of Smyrna has a million 
and a half of piastres. 

Every bishop is obliged to pay an annual 
fine to the patriarch, and this sum is considerable, 
because the bishops are absolutely dependent 
upon him. He can remove them at pleasure. 
To do this, he issues a decree, which is sanctioned 
by the synod, and the Turkish authority exe- 
cutes the sentence. Every bishop or archbishop 
gives money to keep his office ; and the patri- 
arch thus obtains a considerable income. 

The patriarch himself can be removed by the 
synod, with the consent of the government. 
This happened a, few years ago, to the patriarch 
Anthemos. The Greek nation accused him of 
having wasted six million piastres in the space 
of three or four years. It was a scandal to the 
Greek church. There are some national funds 
under the management of the patriarch and a 
commission of lay deputies j it was pretended 



INTRIGUING SPIRIT. 



291 



that Anthimos had gained over the commis- 
sion, and used the money when he saw fit ; but 
Anthimos came into favour with the nation 
again, probably on account of his ability, and 
he was again nominated patriarch. The Greek 
administration too often affords examples of 
intrigues. The blundering spirit of the Lower 
Empire still reigns at Constantinople. 

The higher Greek clergy, excepting the 
patriarch Anthimos, are not distinguished by 
ability and intelligence. I was able tp judge of 
this from the answer sent to the encyclical letter 
of His Holiness Pius IX. # This answer, in the 
form of a refutation, has been printed at Con- 

# We shall publish, however, this document at the end of 
the volume. If it have no great value as a controversial 
treatise, it will serve to show in what manner the Greeks 
not in union understand their orthodoxy. The translator 
from whom we borrow this piece, published at Paris in 1850, 
(E. Klincksieck, Rue de Lille, 11), admits that it treats the 
principal point of the controversy. This is an important 
admission. Once the question of the supremacy of the 
Pope is decided in an oecumenical council between the 
Eastern church and us, all would be decided. 

The answer of the orthodox Eastern church to the ency- 
clical letter of Pope Pius IX. appeared in Greek about the 
middle of the year 1848. Erom the imprint, it appears to 
come from the Patriarchal press of Constantinople ; and the 
Erench translator, whom I have already mentioned, says 
that it may be regarded as approved by the Patriarch, 
having been printed under his auspices. 

On all these accounts the piece is important, 

u 2 



292 



THEOLOGICAL STUDIES. 



stantinople : it is extremely weak. It shines 
neither in theology nor in argument. The 
Greek clergy, who drew up and approved of 
this document, committed, in this matter, an 
act of incredible levity. We do not thus bind 
an important church with an historical past, by 
a pamphlet with no theological importance, in 
which the least prejudiced men against the 
Greeks cannot but remark subtilties, sophisms, 
and all the shifts of argument, where reason 
and good faith are wanting. 

We may hope that there are, in the Greek 
nation, men of sufficient enlightenment not to 
accept this publication as the definitive profes- 
sion of the church's faith. We cannot persuade 
ourselves that it has any official value. There 
are moments in which the wisest minds are 
under evil influences. This ever happens when 
they enlist in the service of prejudiced and 
traditional rancour. 

Theological studies are common at the semi- 
nary in Princes's Island; they are said to be 
somewhat imperfect. The only professor of 
theology in the institution, studied in Germany. 
His name is Tipaldo, He holds no place in the 
hierarchy, but is a simple layman. 

The Armenians have a patriarch, who is so 
both spiritually and civilly. The patriarch of 
the Armenians, like the Greek patriarch, can be 



THE ARMENIAN PATRIARCH. 



293 



removed by his nation. He of Constantinople 
has not the title of patriarch, but is vicar of the 
patriarch, who resides in Armenia. 

The Armenians have three independent 
patriarchs, one of Etmiazin, one of Cis, one of 
Aktamar, in Great Armenia. The patriarch 
Etmiazin, in Russian Armenia, takes the title of 
Catholico, which means universal head of the 
Armenians. The actual prelate is an intelligent 
prelate. The convent of Etmiazin is one of the 
most important in all Armenia. There are 
found the best informed ecclesiastics. A priest 
of this convent studied at the school of Moscow. 

The bishops are nominated by the patriarchs, 
and are dependent upon them. Generally the 
bishoprics are sold to the highest bidder. Some- 
times the diocese ask the patriarch for a person 
whom they like. They obtain him ; but always 
have to pay for the appointment. This is also 
done in the Greek church.* 

The revenues of the Armenian churches con- 
sist of the offerings of the faithful, lands, and 
other real property, the administration of which 
is intrusted to the synod. But at the bottom, 
the bishops manage them. 

* A great religious dignitary in Constantinople told me, 
that the difference between the Greeks and Armenians is 
this, that the former practise simony ' piu manifesta e piu 
imperiosa.' 



294 



ARMENIAN PRIESTHOOD. 



To be an Armenian priest, it is sufficient to 
know how to read. Thus, the ignorance of the 
priests is so great, that many do not know the 
catechism. They marry before ordination. 
Their morals are generally blameless. They 
are unfortunate artisans, or ruined men, who 
receive the protection of some bishop, and 
receive ordination from him. The faithful sup- 
port them. Their children are generally hus- 
bandmen. Amongst these priests some are 
unmarried men ; they are called vartabet, a 
word signifying doctors. They enjoy greater 
esteem than the rest, and out of them the 
bishops are chosen. These, in the Armenian, 
as well as the Greek church, cannot marry. 
Sometimes bishops are taken out of the monks, 
but with a dispensation from the patriarch, 
because the canons say that a monk cannot be a 
bishop. M. Tchamourdjan, to raise the Arme- 
nian church, proposed to the patriarchal council 
to give the most important places to the eccle- 
siastics who had passed through a course of 
study. His advice was rejected, and the old 
routine is kept to. 

The Armenians, like the Greeks, go to church 
and say prayers early in the morning, and de- 
vote the rest of the day to work. Their liturgies 
go back to the time of St. Chrysostom. 

They have two synods, one spiritual, the 



CATHOLIC PRIESTS. 



295 



other temporal. The patriarchal vicar is named 
J acobo. 

The priests of the Latin ritual at Constanti- 
nople amount to forty regular, and eight secular. 
The former comprise the French Lazarists, and 
the different orders of Franciscans; the others 
are the Grseco-Latin priests of the island em- 
ployed in the parishes. There are, further, two 
houses of the Brothers of Christian Schools, and 
two houses of the Sisters of St. Vincent de 
Paul, 

Among the Latins there are a good many 
Armenians from Aleppo. The Armenian Ca- 
tholic patriarch was anxious to draw them into 
his nation, but they resolved to remain Latins. 
They preferred the general tolerance of the 
Latin church to the strictness of Christian dis- 
cipline, still rigorously preserved among the 
Armenians. The Latin nation had, about 
twelve years ago, a temporal chief, who was a 
priest. At present he is a layman. His name 
is M. G. Yarthaliti. He- is paid by the nation 
whom he represents, and for whom he acts. 
Each nation has its council, which is also called 
a deputation. The members of the council are 
elected every three or four years by the general 
assembly. 

The Greek Catholic ritual united with Rome, 
has at Constantinople only a little chapel served 



296 



RELIGIOUS DISSENSIONS. 



by one priest and his deacon. The community 
consists of about fifty faithful, almost all Syrians. 

The Catholic Armenians are much more nu- 
merous at this time: intestine dissensions disturb 
their union. These dissensions were so great 
that the patriarch was sent to Home. The 
question on which the Armenians are divided 
is this : one party, brought up by the Propa- 
ganda of Rome, are bent upon abolishing the 
Armenian ritual, and upon Latinizing the 
nation by introducing the customs, ceremonies, 
and liturgy of Rome. The others wish to pre- 
serve their ritual and ancient liturgy. The 
learned and pious Mekatarists of Venice and 
Paris belong to the latter party. They are con- 
vinced that the way to delay and to, perhaps, 
prevent the union of the Armenians still sepa- 
rated from Pome, is to manifest a tendency of 
robbing the nation of its national litnrgy. 
They know that attachment to this liturgy has 
been a powerful means of preservation for the 
faith, and they fear the religious indifference 
which might follow the introduction of a ritual 
to which the Armenians are completely strangers, 
however worthy of respect as the ritual of the 
mother church. 

A pamphlet, written in Italian, and privately 
printed at Constantinople, under the title of 
" II Mecharista," full of offensive things against 



PARTY WRITINGS. 



the venerable Mekatarists, has raised the indig- 
nation of the Armenian catholics attached to 
their national liturgy. They have complained , 
not without reason, of this malevolent attack. 
M. the Yicar- Patriarchal of the Latins has 
made an inquiry, the publication of which has 
revealed all the scheming of the enemies of the 
worthy Mekatarists. There is no doubt that 
Eome does not understand the importance of 
preserving the rituals of the different nations 
who return to Catholicism, and does not blame 
the short-sighted zeal of men who believe they 
do her service by imposing upon other nations 
liturgies and customs foreign to their education 
and religious habits. The venerable M. Hille- 
reau took the side of the Mekatarists, and his 
presence at Rome will contribute not a little to 
throw light upon the question, and to obtain its 
decision in accordance with the real interests of 
Catholicism in the East. The triumph of the 
Latin partizans would exercise a deplorable in- 
fluence upon the future. It would be difficult, 
hereafter, to speak of the union of the churches, 
after men had excited legitimate fears for the 
preservation of those liturgies to which the 
Orientals have been always strongly attached. 

An amiable Frenchman for whom I had a 
letter of introduction, M. Louis Gardey, pro- 
fessor of mathematics in the engineering school 



298 



OUR TRAVELLING PLANS. 



at Constantinople, was to introduce me to 
M, Fossati, the Sultan's architect, who had just 
finished the restoration of St. Sophia. I was 
very desirous to see this majestic edifice in all 
its details, and I could not do so with greater 
interest and benefit than under the auspices of 
the intelligent architect who has restored to this 
remarkable building some of its former splen- 
dour. 

A preliminary call was however necessary, 
and I had only a few days before me. My 
impatience, which little brooked the delay that 
this step would occasion, had its way, and with- 
out waiting any longer, I began by myself ear- 
nestly to examine St. Sophia. In the plan of 
our journey, after having visited Palestine, we 
were to undertake a long excursion across Asia 
Minor, from the southern coast opposite Cyprus 
to Trebizond, whence we were to return to 
Constantinople. M. Saulcy had definitely 
decided upon this plan. I, therefore, left 
my luggage and my herbarium from Greece 
at the hotel where we lodged, in order to 
take no more than was indispensable until my 
return. We proposed, then, to ask for a firman 
to visit St. Sophia. It will be seen, hereafter, 
what weighty reasons led M. de Saulcy to 
change our route. We did not return to Con- 
stantinople. I congratulate myself, therefore, 



VISIT TO ST. SOPHIA. 



299 



that I listened to the impatience I felt to 
penetrate, at all costs, into this building. I 
should now have otherwise had the bitter regret 
of not knowing it. No one must speak of art 
in the East who has not seen St. Sophia. 

I devoted my first examination to obtaining 
an exact acquaintance with the plan of the 
building ; the disposition of the numberless 
bays which throw such a brilliant light into it ; 
I made drawings of their form, whether curved 
or in plat-band. To do this I had to penetrate 
into the courts surrounding the mosque. I 
passed two entire days in the examination of 
the exterior, with my pencil continually in my 
hand for notes and sketches. The Turks seemed 
to me little to mind the presence of a stranger 
in a European dress, and wearing on his head 
the hat which offends their feelings as much as 
the turban displeases cur eyes ; they let me go 
and come incessantly, without troubling them- 
selves at my presence. 

I grew bolder from this first expedition. 
Once I had obtained, by the help of my draw- 
ings, a tolerably clear idea of Justinian's edifice, 
which it is difficult, at the first approach, to 
separate from the massive constructions of a 
later date with which it has been shored up. 
I ventured to penetrate into the interior. It 
is well known that a man hazards his life who 



300 



ST. SOPHIA. 



enters this mosque without a firman from the 
Sultan, and being accompanied by government 
officials. As though I had had a presentiment 
that I should not return to Constantinople, and 
to obtain a precise idea of the building of the 
sixth century, which has been a type for all 
Islam mosques, I did not give any heed to my 
fears, and twice entered St. Sophia. I chose 
the periods in which the vestibules and the 
narthex, a large gallery on which open the nine 
doors which give admission to the building, 
were completely deserted, and in which I sup- 
posed few Mussulmans would be within. Success 
crowned my temerity. After having crossed 
the great and beautiful court of Chadirvan, in 
which is the great fountain for ablutions, I 
boldly advanced towards the vestibule by which 
the narthex is entered. The door is of bronze, 
and comes out of a temple of the best Greek 
period. "We hope M. Fossati will give a fine 
drawing of this gate, which itself is a monu- 
ment. We there see inlaid in silver the mono- 
grams of Michel and of Theodora. 

On the arch of the gate facing this, and lead- 
ing to the narthex, M. Fossati discovered under 
the colouring the portraits of Constantine and 
Justinian. I was going to penetrate into the 
narthex when one of the guardians appeared all 
at once to me, and murmured some words, 



THE GREAT PORCH. 



301 



which seemed far from pleasant. I withdrew 
prudently, yet without precipitation. As soon 
as I departed from the vestibule, the good- 
natured Turk took no more notice of me. I 
then went out of the chadirvan, and taking the 
outer street, went towards the vestibule opposite 
to that which I had already wanted to enter. 
There I met nobody ; advancing softly, not 
without a kind of heart- beating, I found myself 
in the narthex or porch, an immense corridor, 
sixty yards long and ten yards broad. In front 
are beautiful vestibules, the large doors of which 
are in plat-band, and adorned with mouldings, 
the outline of which is solemn, though a little 
overdone. The cornices of the doors were 
copied by the architects of St. Sophia from 
those of the temple of Baalbec ; at least I 
believe that I found this resemblance in 
them. 

This porch had suffered greatly. Tn the 
restoration of M. Fossati, it has recovered some 
beauty. Unhappily the considerable portions 
which have lost their marbles are painted in 
imitation of marble, which offends the eye in 
a building where the finest marbles of the East 
are lavishly displayed. The eye is offended 
with these coarse imitations of marble, in crude 
colours and in tints which remind one of a badly 
decorated theatre. The architect has here been 



302 



THE GREAT FACADE. 



wanting in taste : it is so difficult to be mode- 
rate in a restoration. I could enjoy the mag- 
nificence of the porch. Nine large doors in 
plat-band, surmounted also with cornices with 
numerous mouldings, give admission from the 
narthex into the interior of the church. Five 
doors open on to the facade of the structure. 
This facade furnishes an example of the ancient 
atrium or vestibulum of the Greeks. On the 
buttresses of the facade, we still see the place 
formerly occupied by the famous bronze horses 
of Corinth, which are now at St. Mark's, 
Venice ; and of which we have a copy on the 
triumphal arch in the Place du Carrousel, in 
Paris. 

I entered St. Sophia by the second door, 
which opens into the narthex. I was not then 
in the axis of the building ; but by the most 
singular coincidence, it was the most favourable 
point for catching the most magical effect of 
light in the building. I shall never forget the 
surprise I felt in the presence of this marvellous 
creation of Christian art. I had visited many 
churches, and admired many fine cathedrals ; 
art, under all its forms, in all its secrets of pro- 
portion, of harmony, and of distribution of light 
I had discovered in my researches ; and I could 
not believe anything was greater than our 
Gothic cathedrals, for the overwhelming im- 



UNIFORMITY OF PLAN. 303 

pression produced upon the religious soul. The 
Parthenon had already overcome me ; St. Sophia 
showed me what cathedrals have not, and the 
Parthenon could not have. St. Sophia is in- 
comparable. It is a work of incredible sim- 
plicity ; in that respect it corresponds with the 
works of antiquity, perhaps, and surpasses them. 
Exactly the reverse of those cathedrals which 
open to one's view with their pointed arches 
supported by a forest of piers, and show you 
these mysterious sanctuaries only as you tra- 
verse the immense space round which they 
radiate, the Byzantine building appears at 
once in its full extent. You embrace the view 
in a glance : it strikes by its unity. The plan 
alone indicates this admirable arrangement. It 
is almost a regular square, which, however, by 
the prolongation of the large apse, is somewhat 
oblong. The width of the square is about 
seventy yards, and its length ninety-one yards. 
Four enormous piers support four large semi- 
circular arches, on which rests the cupola. 
"Whatever part of the building you look at, this 
wonderful cupola, all glittering with mosaics of 
gold lighted, by forty windows suspended from 
large arches fifty-five yards above the floor deve- 
lop themselves with incredible magnificence. 
The cupola is ninety-three Paris feet wide. 
A central cupola terminated by an apse the 



304 PORPHYRY COLUMNS. 

middle aisle. The two spaces on the outside 
form two side aisles, if it is not better to con- 
sider their central part as the two arms of a 
cross ; and four arches at the angles of the 
square complete the edifice. What noble sim- 
plicity ! Then two side aisles, the arches of 
which are not very high, form above an im- 
mense gallery, reserved for the women in gene- 
ral: the roof of this is supported by 107 columns, 
eight of which are of Egyptian porphyry, 
from the temple of Ephesus, and the others of 
verd-antique. Nothing is equal to the beauty 
of this gallery, from the top of which the build- 
ing has a marvellous appearance. From the 
place where I was, I saw on the left, the 
northern side aisle. The two columns of por- 
phyry, placed on the two sides of the door in 
the north corner, were taken from the temple 
of Ephesus : the urn of Proconessus marble, seen 
on the right, was carried away from Pergamos, 
where it formerly served for ablutions.* 

* In working on this portion of the edifice, the architect 
who restored St. Sophia discovered, under the colouring, the 
first mosaic, which made him determine to lay open all the 
remaining arches. This first gallery being restored, but 
still covered by a screen, M. Fossati, knowing that the 
Sultan was impatiently waiting for the day on which he 
might examine the works, sent word to him one morning 
that if he would come, he might easily judge, from the por- 
tion already done, what the whole would be when the resto- 
ration was completely finished. An hour after this message, 



THE CENTRAL DOME. 



305 



The immense aisle was open before me, sur- 
mounted by its brilliant dome. There is no 
building in the world with such vast and ma- 
jestic proportions. The volume of air contained 
in the edifice was coloured at this instant by 
the sun's rays, which fell in undulations from 
the numerous windows of the cupola and of the 
lower aisle on the south, across the beautiful 

the Grand Signor arrived at the mosque. At a signal, the 
veil fell, and the padishah, overwhelmed at the sight of the 
roof covered with gold, as brilliant as on the first day, cried 
out, looking anxiously at the artist : " Wretched man ! you 
have ruined me. M. Eossati then explained to him that this 
gold was there from the beginning, and that he had only to 
take off a coating of colour, to find it in all its brilliancy. 
This explanation put him in good humour, and he strongly 
animadverted upon his predecessors for having thus con- 
cealed these beautiful gildings and decorations. Then turn- 
ing maliciously towards those of his suite whom he knew to 
be most fanatical, and showing them the large figures in 
mosaic of the old emperors : "Is it not impossible," said he 
to them, " in this age of progress, to conceal these precious 
paintings ? Foreigners would look upon us as barbarous, 
were we to destroy these ancient works." All bowed, and 
pretended to applaud this speech. But the artist, like a 
skilful diplomatist, represented to his highness the impossi- 
bility of leaving these Christian paintings exposed to the 
sight of the people. In proof of this, he shewed him 
a head, the eyes of which had just been picked out ; yet 
only the workmen had entered into this part of the mosque. 
It was important, then, to cover them, even for the sake of 
their preservation. The Sultan needed no second entreaty ; 
and he retired, doubly satisfied with the man and his work." 
— " Eestcration of St. Sophia," by M. A. de Beaumont, 
" Oriental Eeview," 1852. 

X 



306 



MOSAIC PICTURES. 



columns plundered from Baalbec. No words 
can express the magnificence of this spectacle. 
What gothic art has placed between the sun 
and the spectator by the help of painted glass 
windows, Byzantine art has placed on the face 
of arches and of cupola by means of mosaics on 
a gold ground. To the windows their natural 
functions have been left. They flood the build- 
ing with light, but the brightness they produce 
does not fatigue the sight, so well is it tempered 
by the pictures in mosaic with which the whole 
edifice is covered. It is more religious, more 
solemn, than the glass windows which darken to 
no purpose our cathedrals. Christianity cannot 
be contradicted by art; it is come to bring 
light; the art which it inspires ought to throw 
light like itself. Wall paintings and mosaics 
are the natural decorations of Christian churches ; 
they produce an admirable religious effect ; but 
they become an impossibility and a contradiction 
with stained glass, which changes their tints 
and destroys their harmony. They need, like 
the understanding of the believer, the purest 
light of day. 



BYZANTINE ART. 



307 



CHAPTEK XIII. 

Byzantine Art. — Language of Signs. — Mahomedaii Taste. — 
The Lazarist Fathers. — Eastern Families.- — ^Rhodes.— 
The Knights of St. John. — The Holy Land. — Beyrout. — 
Curious Mosaic. — Our Companions. — Distant view of 
Lebanon. — Khan of El Kalda. — Sarcophagi. — Itinerary 
of Jerusalem. — Eiver Damour. — Sidon. — The Latin 
Monks. 

I can understand why Islaniisin, with its mo- 
notheism, has adopted for its temples the type 
of the Agia Sophia : it proclaims, evermore, the 
ideas of the greatness, power, and majesty of 
God. The cupola corresponds to these ideas, 
and is their material manifestation ; produced 
by concentric lines without end, the cupola 
seems to have the character of immensity. 
Science in our day sets great value upon our 
edifices of the middle ages, which received the 
cupola from the East, and have preserved it in 
its primitive simplicity. It would be a curious 
study to examine why Byzantine art, which is so 
majestic by its cupolas, and of which the West 



308 POINTED ARCHITECTURE. 

offers some interesting types, — St. Mark's, Ve- 
nice; St. Front, Perigord; St. Peter, Angou- 
lerne, — has not developed itself more fully, and 
formed our national architecture. It had on its 
side nobility, solidity, cheapness, — all precious 
things. The ogival art. that we shall soon see 
arising out of Arabian civilization, overcame it. 
The calm, contemplative, and solemn idea that 
had produced the cupola was not transmitted to 
the adventurous races who loved a brilliant, 
dramatic, and fantastic art.. Notwithstanding 
numberless attempts, the cupola has always mis- 
carried with us. The very remembrance of St. 
Sepulchre's cannot overcome our penchant to- 
wards an art which better satisfied our enthu- 
siastic nature, and fully rendered our ardent 
aspirations. 

After comparing my remembrances of art, 
and placing side by side all the religious build- 
ings that I have seen, St. Sophia is in my 
opinion the eminently Christian church. 

The basilica of Constantine, as I have studied 
it at Bethlehem and Baalbec, has more sim- 
plicity and nobleness: it perfectly renders pri- 
mitive Christianity; it corresponds to the great 
sacerdotal figures of early ages ; it comes up to 
the statues of Cyril of Jerusalem, of Jerome, 
and of Ambrose • it is pure and limpid, in point 
of art, like their eloquence. I am convinced 



BYZANTINE ARCHITECTURE. 



309 



that the architecture of the basilica, which, 
however, admits mosaic work on the face of 
the walls, will, in more advanced ages, be the 
type of Christian art, which humanity, then 
Christian, will emulate. 

The Byzantine church, more poetical and ma- 
jestic, made for periods in which the senses 
required strong religious impressions, lends itself 
wonderfully well to the wants and instincts of 
our ages of transition. I am surprised, that in 
place of giving us gothic, the reproduction of 
which is an anachronism, men of some archi- 
tectural genius are not inspired with the emi- 
nently Christian type of St. Sophia. Islamism, 
which, after Christianity, is the most spiritual 
religion, has found nothing better for its mosques ; 
and certainly, no one will say that in richness and 
magnificence our most sumptuous cathedrals 
can vie with St. Sophia. An art which should 
take this model as its type would at once satisfy 
men of severe taste, who do not like gothic 
gewgaws, and of dreamy imaginations, who re- 
quire gold, marble, and brilliant pictures to 
excite religious feelings, and suggest a spirit of 
prayer. 

I remarked at St. Sophia, as well as at the 
great mosque of Beyrout, which I also pene- 
trated, that the Mahometans place their mihrab, 
or sacred recess, which corresponds to our altar 



310 



UNCOVERING THE HEAD. 



and chancel, in the direction of Mecca, so that 
at St. Sophia the mihrab is on the south- 
east side of the building, and at Beyrout on the 
south. The Christians, on the contrary, build 
their churches clue east and west, and do not 
place their axis in the line of direction with 
Jerusalem. I think that the same thing is 
done in other mosques, in all the regions where 
Islamism is dominant. The mosques of Africa, 
in the latitude of Mecca, would have their mihrab 
due east. Nothing is so strange as to see in 
St. Sophia all the faces turned on one side, 
instead of looking, with the axis of the church, 
to the east, in conformity with the Christian 
ritual. It is not less offensive at Beyrout. This 
mosque was formerly a Latin church, in the 
Romanesque style, with three apses. The 
mihrab is joined to the wall of the side aisle 
on the south. 

I greatly wished to prolong my curious ex- 
amination of the interior of St. Sophia ; but it 
was the time of prayer, and one of the guardians 
perceived the presence of a Christian in the 
mosque. I had very respectfully taken off my 
hat ; but this is not the sign of religious respect 
in the East. I ought to have taken off my 
shoes. It was on ray part the same impropriety 
as in our eyes entering church with the head 
covered. The guardian directed his steps to- 



LANGUAGE OF SIGNS. 



311 



wards me, addressing certain words to me that I 
did not understand ; he then made a sign which 
I did not know any better how to interpret. 
He extended one of his hands, and touched it 
with one of the fingers of the other hand. 
This sign meant : " Have you a firman to pene- 
trate into the mosque ?" (The signature of the 
Grand Signor resembles a hand.) I thought he 
was threatening to strike me ; and I went back 
and left the church by the vestibule at the north 
of the narthex. A little frolicksome child, who 
had followed me several times while I was 
sauntering round the building, came and offered 
me some cubes of the mosaics of St. Sophia. I 
bought them. These cubes are of glass, one 
surface of which is polished and gilt. They 
were hardly eight millimetres broad. # 

* I must have the pleasure of enlarging upon the details 
of this curious building. I discovered the cross sculptured 
in bas-relief on three panels of white marble, which are at 
the bottom of most of the windows. Each of these panels 
is an oblong square, adorned with a framing. A circle, 
which takes up all the height of the panel, encloses the 
cross. It is singular that this cross is the Latin, and not 
Greek ; that is to say, that its foot is longer than its upper 
branch and the two lateral branches. These two branches 
do not join the circle which frames the cross. Neither of 
these crosses has been mutilated. I made drawings of 
several capitals, with capricious and elegant forms. One of 
them is formed of a wide corbel, on the top of which is the 
Latin cross, the summit of which is framed in a serrated 
circle. Doves under the tailloir fill the place of volutes. 



312 



MIXED STYLES. 



St. Sophia had received all my admiration. 
I went, however, to inspect the mosque of Soli- 
man, one of the finest of Islamism. The 
remarkable thing in these buildings is, that 
being of a much later construction than the 
ogive art, these windows are semicircular, while 
the broken arch prevails in the doors and in the 
galleries. One would say of some old Byzan- 
tine churches, that the Turks, after the taking 

The architect of St. Sophia surrounded the columns with 
marble and porphyry, taken from ancient temples, with 
bronze rings generally placed, one in the middle of the shaft, 
the two others under the capital and at the base. One of 
these beautiful columns, decorated in this way, was lying 
down in the vestibule which opens to the east on the place 
of St. Sophia. I was able to examine at my leisure. I 
counted in the building 130 windows, the greater part with 
two or three mullions, which throw an immense light into it. 

M. Tossati has just published, at London, a folio album, 
with views of St. Sophia, which are tolerably accurate. 
The drawings in chromo-lithography are very poorly done. 
Our Paris lithographers do them much better. The tints of 
the interiors are far too crude. They are not so aerial and 
blended as in nature. M. Fossati promises us a more solid 
atlas, by which we shall be able to study this wonderful 
building, which is still little known, although much talked 
of. The fortunate restorer of St. Sophia will publish his 
drawings quite complete. "We shall there find those mosaics 
which, on account of Mussulman prejudices, he has had to 
hide under a slight coat of gold, which a sponge is sufficient 
to remove. He owes this compensation to science. We 
are not much indebted to him for a sort of bird's-eye view of 
Constantinople from the top of St. Sophia. We are tired 
of the picturesque; the labours of a severe archaeology suit 
us better, but are still deficient. 



MAHOMETAN TASTE* 



313 



of Constantinople, had changed them into 
mosques by surrounding them with galleries 
and porticos in the Arabian style. I at first 
thought so ; but this idea will not bear exami- 
nation. "What has made the architect preserve 
the semicircular arch, is that the ogive bay is a 
contradiction to the cupola. These beautiful 
mosques, standing by themselves in the centre 
of spacious courts, surrounded with graceful 
galleries, supported by light columns in imita- 
tion of the ancient temples, and presenting at 
their angles the marvellous minarets, from the 
top of which man calls man to prayer, attest the 
taste of the Mahometans. 

November 30. — To-day we are to leave Con- 
stantinople. I shake hands with the tender 
friends whose regards and kind attention of 
every sort have made my stay in this great city 
full of pleasure. I found them there, as though 
placed by Providence to give me most valuable 
particulars on the religious state of the East. 
Another horizon is opening before me. I am 
leaving Europe, and I shall be a better judge of 
it at a distance, than when I was myself mixed 
up in its activity, and carried along by the 
movement that seems to be its mission to com- 
municate to the world. The religious question 
— the object of my researches — is no longer 



314 



THE LAZARIST FATHERS. 



confined, in my eyes, to the narrow circle within 
which, till now, it has been circumscribed. 
Many things which seemed to me impossible of 
realization, now appear under new conditions. 
I have, besides, fewer prejudices ; I am less of 
one nation or of one hemisphere. I am be- 
come more a man. This change in idea, I am 
not the only one who has experienced : not to 
speak of those men of rare genius, to whom 
such travels through nations are like a revela- 
tion of great thoughts, few men have escaped 
from the influence of this commerce with other 
races. I was not a little surprised at Constan- 
tinople and Damascus, to find, in certain reli- 
gious congregations, in whose bosom thought is 
always restricted, intelligent men who had 
broken the common stamp, and were, solely by 
the logic of what they had seen and understood, 
carried along in the progressive movement which 
is slowly marking the ineffaceable furrow of the 
future. The good Lazarists of Constantinople 
showed me, with veneration, in their chapel, the 
tomb of Louis Florent Leleu, their Superior, 
who died in 1846. The civilization of the East 
owes much to the liberal ideas of this man, who 
joined the breadth of vision of modern thinkers 
to the humble virtue of the children of St. 
Vincent de Paul. 

The deck of the ship which is to carry us 



EASTERN FAMILIES. 



315 



across to Smyrna is overcrowded with passengers. 
Entire families are there huddled together under 
the sails, with their goods and chattels. The 
man of the East carries all with him, — wife, 
children, mats, kitchen utensils, and victuals. 
My fellow-travellers were able, at full length, 
to satisfy their curiosity as artists concerning 
these interesting groups of young women, who, 
there seated as on their divan, at last lift those 
jealous veils which strictly cover them in the 
street ; the old men— heads of families — keep 
near these groups by way of protection, care- 
lessly squatting down. The time of meals is 
that when these novel customs have been best 
studied. Pitchers of soft water have been placed 
with great care amongst the provisions. There 
is a great consumption of water, oranges, and 
dried fruits. Children play upon their mothers' 
knees. Amongst all nations, this picture offers 
the same charm. When night comes on, the 
party arranges themselves as they can for sleep. 
Cushions and mattresses are made ready. Fa- 
milies crowd upon one another ; there is no noise 
in this human ant-hill ; men, women, and chil- 
dren, take their rest under coverings. The 
strictest laws of decency were observed ; nothing 
offended the sight. The ample garments of the 
Easterns easily accommodate themselves to the 
instinct of modesty. And these people are so 



316 



EHODES. 



severe upon this point, that the slightest impro- 
priety in looks, attitude, or language, would be 
a crime : a lesson for the people of the West. 
A similar crowd of French families, on the deck 
of a steamboat, would have given occasion to 
ten intrigues, and some scandal. 

December 2. — "We reach Smyrna. We spend 
the day there, and set out for Beyrout at four 
p.m. To-morrow we shall be in the roadstead 
off Rhodes. Night is come ; the sea is rough ; 
we must stay on board. To-morrow for the city 
of the knights. 

December 4. — The sea is so rough on our 
rising, that we hesitate to land in the little 
barques which come for us from the harbour. 
We see it breaking upon the shore in foaming 
waves. It is a fine sight, for the man who 
looks at it peaceably from the shore. Never- 
theless, we expose ourselves to the danger, and, 
after several attempts, the barques come along- 
side the ship • and we begin our course, rowing- 
hard towards the harbour. We pass between 
the two moles which formerly supported the 
feet of the celebrated bronze colossus. Rhodes 
is one of the finest creations of the military 
architecture of the Middle Ages. The Turks 
who leave everything to chance destroy nothing. 



THE KNIGHTS OF ST. JOHN. 



317 



The immense citadel is now nearly the same as 
when the brave knights abandoned it. They 
might return hither, and find their houses the 
same as they were three centuries ago. The 
Street of the Knights, silent and sad, seems to 
expect them, or at least some one to take their 
place. Over every door, a great slab of marble 
inlaid in the wall, bears in relief the arms of 
the knight to whom it belonged. You are 
transplanted, as by a stroke of a fairy's wand, 
into a city of the fifteenth century ; and the 
illusion is such that it seems, in the midst of 
this solitude, as if knights in brilliant armour 
were about to issue forth from these pleasant 
mansions. This large and broad street — one of 
the most curious that can be seen — ends at the 
grand master's palace, the greater part of which 
is in ruins. We went to visit the church of St. 
John, which is now a mosque. It is paved 
with broad flag- stones, on which are engraved 
in outline the knights of the order buried there. 
The Mahometans have respected these tombs. 
We took copies of several inscriptions in this 
church. 

At noon, we weigh anchor, and regain the 
open sea. Our steamer, The " Austria," is 
crowded with pilgrims of all races of the East, 
— men, women, and children, — who are going, 
like us, to Jerusalem, for the Christmas holidays. 



318 



CYPRUS. 



The night is still bad ; and these poor creature 
have much to suffer upon the deck, where they 
are soaked in water. This sight excited my 
pity. 

December 6. — We are now at Cyprus, — the 
little kingdom of the Lusignans. We have 
coasted during the night along the dangerous 
shores of this island. For fear of accident, the 
anchor has been cast for some time ; and at 
four o'clock in the morning, our voyage was 
continued to the harbour of the little town of 
Larnaca. We have a magnificent sun. We are 
put on shore. 

M. de Saulcy bought some ancient statues, 
rather often found in this island. They are 
statues of Yenus carrying Adonis, nearly of the 
same coarse execution as our small Madonnas of 
the middle ages. The resemblance is so perfect 
that one might be easily deceived, so much do 
hieratic ages go on the same principles. 

We drank some excellent wine of the Com- 
mander's. It is red, tastes exquisitely, and is 
warm and cordial. 

Spring is begun in Cyprus : everywhere we 
see leaves and flowers. We had a delightful walk. 
What a misfortune that these two fascinating 
islands, Rhodes and Cyprus, with their vines 
and palm-trees, are in the hands of these poor 



BROCHARD DE CHARPIGNIE. 319 



Turks, who seem made to let everything perish. 
At night we leave Larnaca. I took a copy of 
the inscription of a beautiful funeral slab found 
this very year in the island of Cyprus. It is 
the lid of the tomb of Brochard of Charpignie ; 
this slab is of grey marble, and is two yards 
long by eighty-two centimetres wide . Th e knight 
is represented in outline ; his hands joined, the 
helmet on his head, over the coat of mail which 
covers him altogether ; he is arrayed in a 
cuirass ; he has the sword and the crown, and 
the arms of this crown are three burettes ; 
his feet, covered with a small, sharp-pointed 
spur, rest upon two dolphins. The inscription 
is in floriated characters of the thirteenth cen- 
tury : 

BKOCAKDVS De CnARPIGMe \ miLeS : .... K : PeTRi 

p...phen : episcopi j cvius j Anim... QviescAT j in PAce j Amen 

Was this Brochard de Charpignie father or 
brother of the bishop ? The word that would 
point this out is in part effaced. Is mention 
here made of the bisop of Phoeno, a small city 
of Palestine, between Petra and Zoar ? or rather, 
are the letters phen of the inscription only the 
end of a word ? This is a point which I will 
not attempt to decide. However, this slab is 
very beautiful. It is to be wished that it were 
brought to France ; it would fill a fine place in 
a museum. M 



320 



THE HOLY LAND. 



December 7. — The "Austria" has cast anchor 
in the roads off Beyrout. "We are at the end of 
our voyage. Some claps of thunder, — according 
to the ancients a happy omen, — came down from 
Lebanon, the long chain of which was before 
us, half enveloped in mist. "We also had thunder 
as a salute on our arrival at Sparta. 

At length we touch the Holv Land of the 
East. We are in the ancient Phoenicia. A few 
more days, and we shall see Sidon, Tyre, Ptole- 
ruais, J affa, and J erusalem : the ancient cities 
of these celebrated countries are only a few days 7 
journey from the place of our landing, — Antioch, 
Baalbec, Damascus, even Palmyra, if we but 
had the courage to go there. 

For my own part, eveiything palls before the 
great image of Jerusalem, and the cities of the 
Holy Land. The few days of rest that we are 
to take at Beyrout appear to me an age, not- 
withstanding the interesting researches to which 
I devoted myself with my learned friend on the 
ruins of the ancient Berytus. He took a plan 
of a basilica, the thick walls of which are, in 
every storm, covered by the waves. Visits to 
the inhabitants of Beyrout, to whom we had 
introductions ; delightful botanizing in the envi- 
rons of the city, where spring is already begun, 
and preparations for a journey which is to last 
several months, fill up our long hours. At 



BEYROUT. 



321 



length we set out, We intend to be at Beth- 
lehem on the 25th of December. My beloved 
fellow-travellers desire to be present at the 
solemnities of Christmas. I am to celebrate 
for them the awful sacrifice, in the very place 
where the Saviour of the world was born ; and 
to preach near the grotto where St. Jerome 
meditated upon the humiliation of the Word 
made flesh. 

December 13. — I will not now describe the 
delightful Beyrout. We shall often return thi- 
ther, and I shall speak of it with delight when 
I relate my journeys to Mount Lebanon, Mount 
Carmel, and on the coast of Palestine, from 
St. Jean d'Acre to Jaffa. I will only quote 
the words of M. de Saulcy, which express the 
first impression experienced on looking at Bey- 
rout from the sea :— " A l'aspect serieux des 
terres orientales deja vues a Rhodes et en 
Chypre, se joint ici la physiognomie des bords 
fleuris d'un lac de Lombardie. Tout est ver- 
doyant : les maisons, des qu'on s eloigne du 
centre de la ville, paraissent de charmants pa- 
vilions, semes avec art au milieu de bouquets 
d'arbres."* Such is, in reality, Beyrout, one of 
the most charming cities of the East. 

* " Voyage autour de la Mer Morte et dans les Terres 
Bibliques," par E. de Saulcy, tome i, p. 7. 

Y 



322 



CURIOUS MOSAIC. 



It may be easily supposed that we turned to 
profit the time that we spent there before our 
departure to Jerusalem. Near the ancient ba- 
silica, I discovered a remarkable fragment of a 
curious mosaic, which my learned friend has 
thus described, not forgetting my adventure 
with the Pacha, on the occasion of this archaeo- 
logical godsend : — 

" Cette mosaique est tres grossiere : les cubes 
blancs et rouges qui la constituent sont inegaux 
et irreguliers ; ils ne desinent aucune rangee 
bien allignee, mais bien des taches sans contour 
arrete. Ces cubes sont d assez fortes dimensions, 
et ils composaient une espece de pavage dont 
nous avons retrouve plus tard les analogues dans 
les ruines d'edifices bien anterieurs aux Grecs et 
aux Romains. Cette mosaique, a peine cou- 
verte d'une legere couche de terre, forme encore 
aujourd'hui le sol du chemin. Ce fut l'abbe qui 
la reconnut, et dans son enthousiasme, il se hata 
d'en decouvrir une plaque assez large, qu'il 
resolut d'enlever. Le lendemain de grand matin, 
malgre les clabauderies de quelques passants, il 
en vint a ses fins, mais non pas sans eveiller les 
soupcons de l'autorite Turque, qui ne peut pas 
supposer que des Frandjis cherchent en terre 
autre chose que de Tor. Le bruit se repandit 
incontinent dans la ville que le pauvre abbe 
avait deterre* je ne sais quel tresor. Le pacha 



OUR COMPANIONS. 323 

s'en emut ; il envoya un detachement de soldats 
et quelques officiers pour s'assurer du fait, et 
pour fouiller la place signalee comme recelant 
des richesses."* There was some obviously to 
be had for the trouble. I had carried off the 
real treasure, — two enormous fragments of a 
mosaic of a distant period, which I put upon 
the back of two strong men, and which we 
kept at our hotel to send into France. 

The weather had been rainy for several days. 
On the 12th we at length decided upon fixing 
our departure for the next day. We set out in 
reality, but very late ; the troubles of a caravan 
of twelve or fourteen persons, a score of horses 
and mules for the baggage, took up a deal ot 
time. M. de Saulcy has described, with his 
usual animation, the personnel of our expe- 
dition: — "Our Greek cook, Constantine, the per- 
fect type of the Greek rogue — the most perfect 
of all rogues ; the under -cook, Nicolas, a Mace- 
donian ; the most illustrious of all, Andre 
Heboul, a great Levantine, that we took at 
Athens, and who accompanied us with the title 
of dragoman : he was dressed like a Turk, and 
his costume, which was quite red, made him 
the most singular personage that it is possible 
to imagine. He knows Turkish, but unhappily 
* " Voyage autour de la Mer Morte," tome i. p. 18. 

Y 2 



324 



DISTANT VIEW OF LEBANON. 



is ignorant of Arabic, which is the language of 
the country." 

The way out of Beyrout is delightful. In 
the foreground some large pine-trees spread out 
their heads like a parasol. It is said that the 
Ernir Fakhr Eddin planted these pine-trees to 
arrest the sands of the sea, which, driven by the 
southerly winds, accumulated in high banks 
year after year, encircled Beyrout, and by con- 
tinuing to advance, threaten sooner or later to 
overwhelm it. Not far off is a forest of 
younger pines. Beyond them tower the lower 
spurs or elevations of Mount Lebanon, and on 
the horizon, its most elevated peak, the Samin, 
covered with snow of dazzling whiteness. Add 
to this natural scenery, to which our eyes are 
accustomed, the sandy road, where the horse's 
feet sink down, bordered with cactuses, putting 
forth their flowers, dotted with prickles which 
sparkle like little stars ; in turns, sycamores, 
carob-trees, bead- trees, a beautiful cariophylla, 
which opened on every slope of the road its 
diapered corolla, under a genial opening sun, 
on the 13th of December, and you have a 
faint idea of the sight which we felt so im- 
pressive. 

I had begun my Eastern herbarium from the 
very first, and I continued it throughout the 



KHAN OF EL KALDA. 



325 



journey, and found it an interesting employ- 
ment. I gathered in these sands the beautiful 
cariophylla, with large petals, of which I have 
just spoken, a small arabis, crocuses, titymales, 
blue anemones, violets, and roses. The anemone 
is the flower lavished by nature in the East. 
It takes all forms, is decked with all colours, 
grows everywhere, and carpets all the roads. At 
one time it is small and humble like our violets, 
hidden under a bunch of leaves ; at another, it 
rises broad, majestic, and slightly bending upon 
its stem. From dazzling white and tender 
rose colour to deep purple, it exhibits the 
richest palette of colours. Sometimes it grows 
alone, or in separate groups, vying in beauty 
and freshness with the half-opened rose-bud ; at 
other times it stretches out in endless sheets, 
forming quite a carpet of flowers. 

We were going to pass by the khan called 
El Kalda, when M. de Saulcy perceived that 
the side of the hill, on our left, was a vast 
necropolis, consisting of a considerable number 
of tombs. He resolved to visit it ; and it 
seemed remarkably curious. We decided put- 
ting off till to-morrow the rest of our route to 
Saida. Our people installed themselves in the 
khan, and each of us began his favourite studies. 
M. de Saulcy has described with great accuracy 
the necropolis of El Kalda. It is so far im- 



326 



SARCOPHAGI. 



portant, as shewing the difference between 
Greek and Oriental art in sepulchres. Here 
there is nothing which recalls the style of 
the Phoenicians, which we shall soon study. 
El Kalda, a Greek colony, buries its dead in 
sarcophagi. They detached from the rock 
enormous blocks, in which deep troughs are 
hollowed out, and covered with sculpture ; lids 
are placed on the top, some of which fit into the 
side by help of grooves : these lids are orna- 
mented in various ways. M. de Saulcy dis- 
covered only one inscription on these tombs, 
that of one Juliana. It was in Greek letters. 
He has given in his plates drawings of several 
of these sarcophagi. Some of them are not sepa- 
rated from the rock. They have been all searched 
without exception, at what epoch is unknown. 
Human curiosity has manifested itself there as 
everywhere. The Greeks now sell for a few 
drachmae the right of searching the tombs of 
their fathers, which time and invasion have 
respected. The Turks, their conquerors, never 
profaned one of these tombs. They respect the 
sacredness of tombs. I could never consent to 
search one during the time of my archaeological 
excursions. My curiosity as an antiquary was 
always overcome by shame as a man and a 
Christian. 

We must do justice to the genius of the 



ITINERARY OF JERUSALEM. 



327 



ancients. In this city of the dead there is no 
contrast with the solemnity of the tomb. The 
type adopted never alters. The tombs are more 
or less great, more or less massive, but they are 
all alike ; and the holy equality of the dead is 
not incessantly violated, as in the cemetries of 
our modern cities, where luxury displays a 
funereal architecture of a wretched style, and 
often lavishly displays the most inappropriate 
epitaphs. 

M. de Saulcy determined, with a great deal 
of justice, that the khan El Kalda was the site 
of the ancient Heldua, laid down in the " Itine- 
rary of Jerusalem. As we were taking our 
repast, numerous pilgrims came to the khan on 
their way to Jerusalem, for the solemnities of 
Christmas. They found no shelter. We occu- 
pied the two chambers of this narrow dwelling, 
and did not find ourselves very conveniently 
lodged. The poor pilgrims, men, women, and 
children, passed the night in the open air, lying 
down on cushions and mats that they carry with 
them, and wrapped up in coverings. The fol- 
lowing morning their caravans set out before us. 
I rose early to go down to the shore and look 
for shells and marine plants. 

December 14. — We were this day to sleep at 
Saida, the ancient Sidon. Our itinerary brought 



328 



KIVER D AMOUR. 



us on the following day to Tyre, and thence to 
St. Jean d'Acre, whence we were to leave 
Phoenicia and enter Palestine. 

In his first volume M. de Saulcy has given 
the ancient geography of this interesting part of 
Syria with such care, that I cannot but refer to 
his excellent work. My two volumes would 
become too bulky, were I here to reproduce his 
observations, or give the result of my own 
researches. The reader should refer to the first 
volume of his travels for the very important 
geography of one of the most celebrated coun- 
tries in history. I completed the work of my 
learned friend for the rest of the coast from 
St. Jean d'Acre to Jaffa. I followed the same 
method as he had, and hope that I have thrown, 
as he has done on Phoenicia, some light upon 
the ancient geography of the coast of Palestine. 

I shall mention, however, the great cities 
that we passed through, and the places whose 
name is connected with some biblical remem- 
brance. 

After having crossed the Damour, the 
Tamyras of the ancients, a charming river, 
whose banks are shaded with verdure, that 
we were able to wade through, notwithstand- 
ing the rains on the previous days, we reached a 
delightful spot called Naby Younes. There, 
according to the tradition of Jews, Christians, 



SIDON. 



329 



and Mussulmans, the prophet J onas was thrown 
upon the shore. 

I cannot resist the pleasure of quoting the 
description given by M. de Saulcy, of this 
charming place, where, afterwards, our fellow- 
travellers, MM. Belly and Loysel, installed 
themselves to draw the scenery. The style is 
worthy of the natural science described by him. 
I made a fine botanizing at Naby Younes. It 
was the early spring of the coast of Syria. 

" It was night when we entered Saida. The 
character of the modern city, built upon ex- 
actly the same site as the ancient Sidon, is quite 
Oriental. High walls, here and there pierced 
with little windows, compose the houses. You 
advance along narrow streets as between the 
walls of two citadels. France possesses in the 
middle of the city a magnificent khan. It is 
almost an Oriental palace. A beautiful gate in 
the broken-arch style gives admission into a 
spacious square court, in the middle of which is 
a great basin of water supplied by a fountain. 
Some beautiful trees, amongst which are several 
banians with broad leaves, overshadow this 
basin. 

" The khan of Saida deserves description. We 
saw few in the East with so much magnificence 
and elegance. That at St. Jean d'Acre has 
perhaps, more display, but less beauty. What 



330 



PICTURESQUE SCENERY. 



gives to the khan at Saida its beautiful charac- 
ter, is an immense cloister to the first floor on 
the rez de chaussee, which serves as its founda- 
tion. This cloister, in ogive arches, runs round 
the inside of the khan. One would say that it 
was one of the fine monasteries of the middle 
ages, but somewhat lighter and less austere. 
On entering the court at night, after having 
silently traversed the narrow lanes of Saida 
behind our guide, this vast court was illuminated 
by a beautiful moon, at that time a little above 
the horizon ; the upper gallery with its thousand 
ogives, stood out admirably in outline. We 
seemed to be entering into one of those en- 
chanted dwellings, so wonderfully described by 
poets and romancers. Nothing can render the 
effect of shade of these plantain trees, spreading 
out their verdure over the basin in which the 
reflected moon seemed softly to rest, and invite 
the soul to meditation, adoration, and prayer. 

" After having dismounted at the entrance of 
the court, we went up into the gallery, whither 
our people had preceded us. "We were led to a 
good Christian woman named Angiolina, the 
old hostess of this khan, who, forwarned of our 
arrival, had put on her trinkets and finery in our 
honour." 

On the following day, while our baggage was 
getting ready, I went to hear mass at the Latin 



THE LATIN CHURCH. 



331 



church, which forms part of this building. 
Some Franciscan monks performed the service. 
This chapel has nothing remarkable, excepting 
some wretched paintings, done twelve or fifteen 
years ago, by a brother, who was as immodest 
a monk as he was indifferent as a painter. 
He has inscribed upon the reredos above the 
altar, his name and the year in which he did 
this miserable work. I have had to forget his 
name. 

The balustrade is of iron. It goes back to 
the early part of the eighteenth century. It 
has in the middle the monogram of Christ ; on 
the right the arms of France, and on the left 
the escutcheon of the order of St. Francis. I 
was pleased to find in the last these three old 
fleurs-de-lys, which recall so much past glory. 
When a symbol is dead, and no longer repre - 
sents any real thing in human progress, there 
attaches to it a sentiment rendering it as sacred 
as the mortal remains of man. They were, too, 
magnificent arms, those of St. Francis ; two 
hands crossing one another, one white, the 
hand of a European, of a civilized and free man, 
the other of a Moor, of a man whom we wish 
to raise out of ignorance and barbarism ; over 
all is the cross, the imperishable symbol of all 
grandeur and freedom. All these are anti- 



332 



ORIENTAL CATHOLICS. 



quated images of a past, which has had its 
glory, but which, in their powerful instinct of 
youth and life, time refuses to reproduce. 

Hence arise the commotions of modern times. 
The past and the future struggle for the mas 
tery, One of the two must plainly give way, 
and the youngest, on account of his vigour and 
courage, will have the victory. But what 
endless strife, what a gloomy spectacle ! How 
much suffering for humanity ! 

The Latin catholics of Saida were present at 
high mass, which was celebrated by one of the 
monks. They were few in number. Only two 
men came in. They wore the Syrian dress, the 
turban, and the shoes of red morocco leather. 
I saw them approach the balustrade, in the 
upper part of the church, where the men are 
generally placed. They made exactly the same 
prostrations as the Mahometans in their mosques. 
They began by putting off their shoes, a great 
mark of respect, and bending their knees ; they 
brought back their wide drawers over their 
feet, to cover them, they then squatted down in 
the Eastern fashion, and in this posture made 
a profound inclination, and began to pray. For 
more than a half-hour before the mass, and 
throughout the mass, they did not alter this 
grave and respectful attitude. They never 



RELIGIOUS GRAVITY. 



333 



moved, nor looked to the right or left. There I 
saw, in all its majesty, the religious gravity of 
the man of the East. 

The women were more numerous. They 
occupied the lower part of the church, and 
squatted down like the men, making, after the 
Eastern manner, a great number of inclinations, 
even to prostrating themselves with their faces 
to the ground. They were unveiled, and a few 
appeared to me remarkably beautiful. They 
were not so grave as the men. I heard behind 
me, during the mass, some whisperings, occa- 
sioned, no doubt, by the prsence of some young 
children, who never leave their mothers. 



334 



MILITARY COLUMNS. 



CHAPTER XIV. 

Am El Qantarah. — Sarepta, — Necropolis of Adloun. — Extent 
of Cemeteries. — Antique Tower. — The Ancient Leontes. — 
Arrival of Pilgrims. — Ain el Barouk. — Euins of Tyre. — 
Cathedral of Tyre. — Coast Scenery. — Solomon's Pool. — 
Serious Accident. — Omm-el-'Amia. — Beautiful Euins. — 
Phoenician Houses. — El Bassa. 

December 15. — We leave Saida by a brilliant 
sun. After having passed the gate by which 
we entered the night before, we passed by the 
houses whose regular line forms a rampart on 
this side. The neighbouring country is full of 
palm and plantain trees of great beauty. I 
shall speak hereafter of the gardens of Saida. 
At a little distance from the city, M. de Saulcy 
copied the inscription of two fine military co- 
lumns in granite, erected upon the ancient 
road from Tyre. They are of the period of 
Septimius Severus. 

It is difficult to form an idea of the number 
of birds of passage who come to enjoy the sun 



AIN EL QANTARAH. 



335 



on all this coast of Syria, where such a general 
spring prevails. Lapwings, larks, and a great 
number of other birds, whose names I am 
ignorant of, flew up every moment, at the noise 
of our horses' feet. One would say that man 
inspired them with little fear. Indeed, the 
people themselves never fire at these birds. 
My witty friend explains this saving of powder 
and shot by supposing that they keep them for 
better opportunities, and for quite a different 
game. I failed later to experience this upon 
the coast of Palestine, after having come down 
from Carmel. 

At noon, we had dejeuner on the sea-shore, 
at an abundant fountain, called Ain el Qan- 
tarah. Nothing is so charming as this situation, 
which consists of a little creek, with sand rocks. 
I gathered some marine plants and shells on 
the rocks. I was able to botanize a good 
while in a rather pretty enclosure adjoining the 
khan El Qantarah. It is bounded on the sea 
side by a row of large tamarisks, as large and 
lofty as our finest trees. Some goldfinches, 
with sweet, melodious note, chant the spring 
on one of the tamarisks, to console them- 
selves for their migration, and await the time for 
their return to our climates. I saw frequently 
our swallows, which had flown from the winter, 
and were receiving hospitality on this smiling 



336 



SAREPTA. 



shore. Somewhat later, in the heat of a de- 
vouring summer, no bird will remain upon this 
shore. Man himself, faithful to the wise law 
of migration, will seek upon the high hills for 
air, breezes, and shade. 

We were then near the ruins of the Sarepta 
mentioned in the bible. Phocas, in his descrip- 
tion of the holy places, calls it Saraphta, and 
tells us that the church, built upon the site of 
the house where the widow gave hospitality to 
Elijah, was in the middle of the city. Its 
modern name is Karbert Sarfent (Ruins of Sar- 
fent). The Arab village which forms the 
modern Sarfent, is on the coast, at a little 
distance from the ruins of the ancient city, now 
washed by the sea. 

We are now on the confines of Tyre and 
Sidon. Our divine Master, passing through 
Upper Galilee, was come near the borders of 
Sidon, which was contiguous to the tribe of 
Asher. A poor Canaanitish woman who dwelt 
in Sidon came out of the crowd, and implored 
the compassion of the Saviour for her daughter, 
who had an unclean spirit. Jesus refused to 
work a miracle on behalf of this stranger, but a 
mother takes no refusal ; and falling at his feet 
she exclaimed: "Lord ! help me." He answered 
her: "It is not meet to take the children's bread 
and to cast it to dogs." She replied, with the 



NECROPOLIS OF ADLOUN. 



337 



answer of such profound humility : u Truth, 
Lord, yet the dogs eat of the crumbs which fall 
from their masters' tables." The Saviour, moved 
by these words, answered her : " O woman, great 
is thy faith. Be it unto thee even as thou 
wilt : and her daughter was made whole from 
that very hour." (Matt. xv. 22—28). The Chris- 
tians had built a church at Sidon on the site of 
the house of this woman of Canaan. It is now 
changed into a mosque. Afc Sidon, then, our 
recollections of the life of Jesus began. A 
little church, the roof of which is fallen in, is 
still seen upon the mountain, three miles from 
the city, in the place where tradition relates 
that Jesus rested, when he was come to the 
borders of Tyre and Sidon. 

After the ruins of Sarepta we met with those 
of an ancient city, mentioned by M. de Saulcy 
under the name of Kaysarieh, of which ancient 
geography makes no mention. 

At a little distance we found an immense 
necropolis hewn out of the side of the mountain. 
It is named Adloun. It had been pointed out 
to M. de Saulcy as possessing an Egyptian stela, 
establishing the passing of Sesostris. He in 
vain wandered over the steep sides of the necro- 
polis to discover the pretended monument : the 
Egyptian stela was not there. In compen- 
sation, we visited the most curious sepulchral 

z 



338 



EXTENT OF THE CEMETERIES. 



chambers. I made plans of a few, and M. de 
Saulcy published others of them in his Atlas. 
These labours upon Phoenician necropoli are of 
great importance. Their examination may afford 
some valuable hints upon eastern art, in the 
prosperous periods of the people who have dwelt 
in Syria and Palestine. M. de Saulcy, one of 
the first travellers who has thrown light upon 
these necropoli, devoted himself to a very in- 
teresting examination of the tombs of the kings, 
of the prophets and judges, and upon the im- 
mense necropolis that surrounds Jerusalem, like 
a funeral enceinte. I have had the happiness of 
helping the learned academician in his minute 
and wearisome inquiries. However little value 
I may attach to my own remarks, they will still 
have the merit of fully confirming, by impartial 
testimony, the greater part of his curious and 
interesting observations. M. de Saulcy has 
proved the existence on the coast of Phoenicia 
of a large number of necropoli, which evi- 
dently belonged to ancient cities. He saw at 
once that the immense cities of the dead, all 
very remote from large cities like Beyrout, 
Sidon, and Tyre, could not belong to these cities, 
but to others of less importance, all situated 
upon the rich Phoenician shore. Afterwards, 
and throughout our travels, Djennin, Nablous, 
Jerusalem, Saphet, and Baalbec have shown us 



ANTIQUE TOWER. 



339 



similar necropoli ; so that M. de Saulcy has 
been able to establish the following as an 
invariable fact. Every necropolis corresponds 
in the closest proximity with the site of an 
ancient city. By taking this observation for a 
res ting-point, travels in the East will offer the 
most vivid interest. At every moment, you 
wrest from their obscurity cities which have 
been forgotten for centuries ; you fix important 
points of ancient geography ; you reconstruct the 
past. M. de Saulcy will have the honour of 
having thus determined a great number of Bib- 
lical cities, of which criticism to this hour had 
only given a doubtful position, or the situation 
of which was completely unknown. 

This fine necropolis of Adloun, where we now 
are, is obviously the Mutatio ad Nonum of the 
litinerary from Bordeaux to Jerusalem. M. de 
Saulcy clearly traces the modern name Adloun 
to the corruption of the words "ad Nonum." 

I had an opportunity, in a second journey that 
I made by myself on the coast of Phoenicia, to 
verify the points already ascertained. Opposite 
to this necropolis I found considerable remains 
of the ancient city stretching down to the sea. 
M. de Saulcy thinks that Adloun is the Orni- 
thon of the ancients. 1 found, on the sea-shore, 
a square tower with ancient basements in great 
preservation. Probably it defended the city on 

z 2 



340 



THE ANCIENT LEONTES. 



this side ; from this point the south rampart 
set out, and went towards the mountain where 
we found the tombs. 

The only addition that I can make to the 
work of my learned friend on the Phoenician 
cities, thanks to two succeeding expeditions I 
made afterwards, is the mention of another 
ancient city, of which I discovered the ruins on 
the most advanced part of the plain, three kilo- 
metres to the south of Adloun. I have found 
this valuable notice in my travelling-notes, and 
I forgot at the time to furnish it to M. de Saulcy 
before he had finished, in his first volume, his 
fine geographical work upon the Phoenician 
cities. 

During the exploration of the necropolis of 
Adloun, our friend, in his eagerness to find the 
famous Egyptian stela, had wandered a great 
way from us. We felt some little anxiety when 
we did not hear him answer our shouts. At 
last he appeared. Xight was come : we had yet 
some distance to go to reach the khan El 
Qasmieh, where we were to pass the night. 

This khan is situated about two hundred yards 
from the broadest and deepest river that we 
had yet met with in Syria. The khan bears 
the name of the river. Nahr el Qasmieh is the 
Leontes of the ancients : it receives the waters 
of the basin which lies between the two ranges 



ARRIVAL OF PILGRIMS. 



341 



of Lebanon. The modern bridge by which it is 
now crossed has still some ancient portions. 

The pilgrims that we had seen at our first 
halting-place from Beyrout had arrived an hour 
before us at the khan. The only room in which 
they were able to find shelter, and into which 
the greater part of them were crammed, was 
given up by order of Andre, our dragoman, who 
had gone before us with the baggage. This 
wild fellow, in a red dress, and speaking Turkish, 
terrified these poor Christians. They left the 
place empty for us, and bivouacked in the spa- 
cious court of the khan, where they passed the 
night in the open air. I met them afterwards 
at Jerusalem, at Calvary, and the Holy Se- 
pulchre, where I saw them give signs of the 
most ardent piety. 

Both of us spent there a somewhat dismal 
night ; and the next day, after having had three 
of our horses stolen — (a robbery with which we 
accused, without any fear of calumniating him, 
our wretched khandgi, whom we forced at last 
to make restitution), we resumed, although rather 
late, the road to Tyre. 

Both the banks of the Leontes are covered 
with considerable ruins, from the khan where 
we stayed, to the sea. So important a position 
ought to be occupied by a flourishing city. In 
reality, M. de Saulcy places here the Leonto- 



342 



AIN EL BAROUK. 



polis of the ancients ; and notwithstanding the 
authority of Strabo, who places that city upon 
the Taniyras, the modern Damour, it is impos- 
sible not to accept the learned restoration. The 
Arabs now call the Leontes, Nahr Lanteh, 
which differs from the ancient name only in 
pronunciation, as the name Damour or Tamour 
is in Tamyras. 

December 16. — The vast plain of Tyre is 
before us. It appears to me very fertile, though 
in parts a desert. Our horses sunk down every 
instant in the black and deep soil of this plain, 
which is filled with water by the heavy rains 
which jDreceded our departure from Beyrout. 
Soon Sour, the modern Tyre, appears in sight, 
on a low headland jutting out into the sea ; it 
was formerly an island, before the labour of man 
and of nature, which every day here heaps up 
sand-banks, had united it to the continent. 

Before arriving at Sour, we made a delightful 
halt near a large fountain, called Ain el 
Barouk, It is a tolerably abundant hot spring. 
It is peopled with small shellfish, of which we 
took in an ample stock. The Tyrians had made 
of it a Solomon's pool, that is to say, by the aid 
of a thick casing of cement and stones, they had 
raised the level of the fountain. A conduit 
that is still to be seen, and which I afterwards 



RUINS OF TYKE. 



343 



traced^ made a long circuit to bring the water 
of this fountain into the city. The conduit 
passed over a canal-bridge, of which I visited 
the ruins between the fountain and the city. 
In this place I made a magnificent bota- 
nization. All the coast from Beyrout presented 
a kind of parterre of flowers. In passing over 
the ruins of Sarepta, the feet df my horse trod 
down anemones ; and the rock covered with 
wild flowers, whence issued forth Ain el Barouk, 
was still strewn with a small liliaceous plant 
with a white sessile flower, of which I collected 
numerous specimens. 

We had some hours to devote to Tyre. A 
common feeling carried us towards the ruins 
(which are still imposing) of the immense cathe- 
dral. I made the plan of it with the greatest 
care possible. I am not aware whether any tra- 
veller has yet published it. It deserves, how- 
ever, some notice. The building is two hundred 
and twenty-one feet long ; and, to the transept, 
one hundred and eight feet wide. There is 
some resemblance between this cathedral and 
that of Beyrout, and certainly they are of the 
same period. There is the same arrangement of 
the inner piers, formed by a pilaster and a half 
column. The same contreforts on the outside. 
But the plan differs in this, that the cathedral 
of Beyrout has no transepts, and its aisles are 



344 



CATHEDRAL OF TYRE. 



the same width down to the apses. The outer 
buttresses at Beyrout are rather projecting. 
They show greater antiquity than those of 
Tyre. 

The cornice has already the numerous mould- 
ings of a later period. The walls are four feet 
thick, the dressing is in height forty centimetres. 
We saw, not far off, on the site of the entrance 
to the north transept, where a door and a ves- 
tibule might have been, magnificent columns 
coupled together, of granite, and of colossal 
dimensions, taken, without doubt, from the 
temple of ancient Tyre, and used in the Christian 
church. They are half-buried in the ground. 
M. de Saulcy speaks of them with admiration. 

The date of this building ought, without 
doubt, to be fixed in the twelfth century, at the 
period when the celebrated William of Tyre, the 
best known historian of the Crusades, was its 
bishop. 

The walls of the Cathedral of Tyre are still 
standing, and of a great height. They serve as 
a rampart to this portion of the modern city ; 
but there are numerous breaches. It is one of 
the Christian ruins of the East, which recalls 
the greatest recollections. The ancient Tyre, 
cursed by the prophets, is at your feet covered 
with sand ; and the fine ruin is still to be seen 
as though to attest the Lord's triumph and the 



9 fp:-'- 

COAST SCENERY. 345 

acconiplisliment of the word that he set upon 
the lips of his prophet when he declared that 
Tyre should one day be no more than a deserted 
coast, where the fisher should come and dry his 
nets. 

i 

We shall, hereafter, describe this ancient 
Tyre. 

1 1 

December 17. — We left Tyre on a delicious 
spring day. We had not, generally, any other 
track than the sand of the sea-shore. It is the 
everlasting road that nature herself has marked 
out. The waves come every instant, and leave, 
as they die away, a light deposit of small grains 
of sand suspended in them ; then they gently 
draw back, and the water which penetrates the 
lower beds hardens them, and prevents the foot 
of man, horse or camel, from sinking down. 
How often, on the beautiful coast of Syria I 
have enjoyed the curious sight furnished by the 
sea in triturating the sands. Some pebbles of a 
silicious nature, disengaged from the abrupt 
sides of the headland which juts out into the 
sea, are thrown into large bays which divide 
these promontories. This is the work of violent 
tempests. The sea, by influx and reflux, keeps 
these pebbles in a state of perpetual movement; 
they go backwards and forwards with the wave 
which holds them ; thus they rub one against 



346 



Solomon's pool. 



the other, and the infinitely small particles 
which are detached by this rubbing, rise up in 
the water, which they whiten as though with 
chalk; and, carried away by it, they spread them- 
selves on the margin in brilliant sheets of small 
thickness. After the wave has deposited the 
sand it holds, the small pebbles which it had 
dragged along with it, fall back by their own 
gravity into the sea to undergo another tritura- 
tion, until the whole is disintegrated. The 
tempests still bring more materials, on which 
the process is continued. 

It is thus that on the coast of Syria these 
masses of sand are heaped up, which little by 
little fill up the little gulfs at the expense of the 
projecting rocks which skirt the sea. We loved 
in our long journeys to play with the wave by 
keeping our good little Arab horses on the 
nearest edge of the sea, and where the waves, 
furious and threatening afar off, fell softly and 
expired at their feet, whitening them with 
foam. 

We passed within some hundred paces of the 
famous Pool of Solomon, of which I afterwards 
examined the remarkable construction. This 
locality is called Ras~el-Ain. I shall describe 
it when I speak of my other expeditions on the 
shores of Syria. 

As we were climbing the Cape Blanc — a wide 



SERIOUS ACCIDENT. 



347 



promontory whose chalky rocks rise in a peak 
from the sea— the fever which had left my 
friend Felicien at Athens, showed itself by a 
violent attack. We were alone behind the 
caravan ; I had dismounted to botanize ; and 
the road was besides so rough and steep, that I 
preferred walking. I advised him to dismount 
also, so dangerous did I find it ; he replied that 
he could not take even four steps, and that he 
had great difficulty in even keeping himself on 
horseback. He had just spoken, when all at 
once I saw him lose his balance and fall heavily 
on the rock which joins the road. I thought 
he was dead. I uttered cries of distress, which 
were heard by our party. We succeeded in 
leading the poor man, who was much bruised 
by his fall, to the summit of the cape. A 
bad khan, hardly covered with boughs, served 
us for shelter. We obtained a little rest for our 
sick friend, and a good night gave him strength 
to remount his horse. M. de Saulcy, horribly 
disturbed about the future journey, if the fever 
still continued, prudently resolved to send back 
his son to France. However, it was settled 
that he should go on to J erusalem, where, after 
a few days' rest, he will be able to return to 
Beyrout and embark. It would be too cruel for 
him not to have seen the Holy City when we 



348 



omm-el-'amid. 



were not more than a few days' journey distant 
from it. 

I made an excellent botanizing on Cape Blanc, 
and I disengaged from the chalky rock some 
echinuses and some fossil shell-fish. 

M. de Saulcy found at the foot of Cape Blanc 
the ruins of an ancient city, called by the Arabs 
Iskenderaun, and which he did not hesitate to 
recognize as the Alexandroschene of the Itine- 
rary from Bordeaux to Jerusalem. 

But a more interesting discovery was to sig- 
nalize this day's journey. An upright column, 
that we perceived on the height on our left, 
after half an hour's journey, attracted the at- 
tention of the indefatigable inquirer whom I 
had the honour to accompany. The Arabs told 
him the name of the place was Omm-el-'Amid, 
the mother of columns. This name alone sti- 
mulated the curiosity of M. de Saulcy, and not- 
withstanding the assertion of the guides, that 
there was nothing to see there, and that travel- 
lers never climbed this hill, he turned his horse 
out of the beaten track, and we followed him 
towards the height, on the top of which we saw 
three upright columns instead of one. We first 
passed over, on the north side of the hill, a vast 
necropolis, the sign of an important city. Soon 
we came to a magnificent plain, filled with 



BEAUTIFUL RUINS. 



349 



numerous ruins, in which each of us began to 
busv himself. 

The temple of Omm-el- A.mid, of which there 
still remain three columns, was of the Ionic 
order, which I will call Asiatic, adopted by the 
people of western Asia at the periods in which 
architecture received amongst them that grace 
and lightness which the Greeks so well knew 
how to imitate. Palm-leaves adorned the top 
of the shaft of these columns. M. de Saulcy 
has given a drawing of one of these graceful 
capitals. On taking up a little mould we dis- 
covered a large mosaic, which formed the pave- 
ment of this temple. The design of the portion 
we succeeded in laying bare, presented to us 
meanders and elegant entrelaces. We could not 
ascertain whether these were representations of 
figures, or a different ornamentation in the field 
of the pavement, of which we had, without 
doubt, examined only the border. I did not 
leave this beautiful mosaic without regret. I 
carefully covered, with the same mould that I 
had taken off, the portion that we had just 
admired. One whole day's exploration past at 
Omm-el- 'Amid would be enough to discover the 
whole mosaic. The vicinity of the sea would 
allow of its being acquired for some one of our 
European museums. The cubes of the piece 
are black, white, and red. 



350 



PHOENICIAN HOUSES. 



I next visited the portion of the ancient city 
nearest to the temple. A strong vegetation is 
come up everywhere; it forms a forest of brush- 
wood, known only to the flocks and herds, 
which the Arabs of a neighbouring village bring 
hither every day. A great many ancient houses 
are still standing. They form simple squares, 
with one door; the style of this door is noble 
and severe; it is the ancient j)lat-band without 
any moulding. I was fortunate in finding this 
example of the houses of a Phoenician city which 
was abandoned at an unknown epoch. I have 
not been able to find again elsewhere, either 
in Greece or in the East, private houses pre- 
served in this manner. I made a careful draw- 
ing of the door of one of these houses. It is 
probable that in ancient times, as at present, 
these houses formed only a simple rez de chanssee, 
banked up with earth, to make a terrace. In 
descending the hill we observed some wall of 
considerable thickness, in appearance cyclopean. 
M. de Saulcy declared that he could not to this 
city assign an historical name, and that he had 
made vain efforts to discover traces of it in the 
geographers and historians of antiquity. 

A small creek that I examined afterwards, 
and on which 1 thought that I discovered some 
ancient constructions, was the harbour of this 
Phoenician city, the most perfect which has 



EL-BASSA. 



351 



been preserved in the East. Under this point 
of view it deserves to be visited by intelligent 
travellers. 

Felicien de Saulcy, with the baggage, had 
continued the journey during our explorations. 
He had taken a lodging in a village situated on 
the left of the road. We joined him at this 
village, called El-Bassa.* 

The jackals, in the early part of the night, 
surrounded the village, and replied to the bark- 
ing of the dogs with their shrill and plaintive 
cries. They served us for an escort until our 
arrival at the house of the Greek cure, who 
gave us hospitality. El Bassa, like all the 
Phoenician places, is built upon the site of an 
ancient city, the fragments of which are found 
in all the walls of the modern houses. 

December 18. — We enter the road again near 
the village of Ez Zeb, situated near the sea, on 
a charming little eminence, and adorned with an 
abundant vegetation. M. de Saulcy recognized 
in Ez Zeb the Achzeb of the book of J oshua 
(xix. 29), and the Ecdippa of Josephus. This 
town of Canaan, allotted to the tribe of Asher, 

* Might not El Bassa be the Chelba or Helba mentioned 
in Judges i. 31, with the other cities of the Phoenicians con- 
tiguous to the tribe of Asher ? 



352 



FRANCISCAN MONKS. 



could never be taken by the Israelites, and the 
Canaanites maintained its possession. 

We had dejeuner about 10 o'clock, on the 
bank of a small river, the Nahr el Meyraah, 
which is crossed by a bridge and a road in good 
repair; this is unusual, and a good omen. A 
town ought not to be far distant. The Turks 
do not exhaust their finances in making bridges. 
We seated ourselves in the shade of beautiful 
orange -trees, in a garden open on all sides and 
almost waste ; the flat is of wonderful fertility. 
I gathered some delightful flowers for my 
herbarium. 

We reached Akka in good time. We went 
by the side and under an arch of Arabian style, 
and a very fine aqueduct of modern construc- 
tion, which brings water into the town. St. 
Jean d'Acre is fortified in the modern manner. 
We entered by a gate of fine appearance, con- 
structed in the European fashion of the last 
century; it is adorned with a frieze; and I think 
I remember, in the metopes, some fleur-de-lys, a 
souvenir of France that one loves to meet with 
in all parts. 

It is the first time that we have received the 
hospitality of the good Franciscan fathers. They 
occupy a portion of the fine khan of St. Jean 
dAcre. The spacious building is guarded by 



ST. JEAN D'ACRE. 



353 



the Turks, who keep at the gate four or five 
soldiers. The side inhabited by the fathers is 
spacious and very clean. We breathed at our 
ease in these asylums that religion has prepared 
for the pilgrim on his journey. We found 
Europe again ; and nothing is so refreshing as 
that which restores, even for a few hours, the 
habits of one's country. The good monks did 
us the honours of their refectory; they set before 
us excellent wine from Bethlehem, which vies 
with that of Cyprus, though the latter is perhaps 
superior. 

St. Jean d'Acre is a military town, the gates 
of which are shut every night at sunset ; the 
greater part of its public buildings are in a state 
of complete dilapidation. It was riddled, in 
1840, by the bullets and shells of the English. 
The careless Turks have not set a stone nor cast 
a handful of mortar over the wounds made in 
the buildings by the cannonade. I saw opposite 
the convent, on the sea-shore, a pretty minaret, 
struck at the time of the siege with a shell. 
The end of a beam projected over the upper 
gallery, displaced, no doubt, by the force of the 
projectiles. There it is, threatening the head of 
any one who passes under the minaret, but it 
does not enter the mind of a Turk to remove 
the ruin. 

From the top of the convent terrace we 

2 A 



354 RECOLLECTIONS OF THE PAST. 

admired the magnificent view of the Gulf of 
Akka. M. de Saulcy has given a masterly 
description of it in these few lines: "Nous 
avons la ville pour premier plan, avec le Mont 
Carmel, qui en est separe par une belle nappe 
bleue, et une mer etincelante de lumiere pour 
horizon. A gauche, s'etend une plaine verdoy- 
ante, que couronnent a environ deux lieues de 
distance des montagnes vertes, sur lesquelles 
paraisseut de beaux villages. # 

To-morrow, on leaving Akka, we shall cross 
the boundaries of the Phoenician cities ; we 
shall enter into the lands of the Israelites ; Na- 
zareth will be our first stage, and we shall be 
in the Holy Land. 

Since leaving my humble hermitage I had 
visited the forsaken domains of nations who 
have played the most brilliant part in the his- 
tory of the world. The stranger who goes 
through the desert climes where such power- 
ful nations Kved, where the genius of man 
erected in the heart of cities grand monuments, 
whose ruins still surprise us, cannot refrain from 
impressions which call forth all that is great in 
the soul. When the recollections of their past 
come crowding upon his memory, and he is 
present at their wonderful works, — when he 

* " Voyage autour de la Mer Morte," tome i. p. 51. 



IP'' 

A SACRED LAND. 355 

follows the development of their civilization, 
the untiring ardour of their conquests, he seems 
to hear a voice within, uttering these forcible 
words — " Siste, Viator ! " "Traveller, stay ! you 
tread the land of heroes." 

Nevertheless, when you cast a serious glance 
upon such magnificence and glory, and wish to 
get a clear view of those conquests which have 
supplied history with its finest pages, and those 
buildings destined to perpetuate so many vain 
triumphs ; if you recall the blood and the tears 
which this glory has cost • if the sad sight of 
nations debased by slavery, and cities ravaged 
by fire and sword, presents itself to your mind, 
the name of these nations becomes frightful to 
you ; you curse history for having thrown gran- 
deur over such crimes ; your eyes are averted 
from these eulogies, because they recall to you 
only generations of slaves whose strength they 
have exhausted. Whatever may have been 
said of these nations, they were not great, for 
they have done harm to humanity. The soil 
which they have covered with magnificent roads 
and costly edifices, is not sacred to the traveller, 
his foot does not rest on it with veneration and 
with love. 

But, there is a land which has not, like 
Greece, had buildings of admirable beauty ; the 
people of which have not, like Rome, dragged 

2 A 2 



356 



TO-MORROW ! 



the chiefs of conquered nations in chains behind 
their triumphal chariots ; and yet, the first time 
that you set foot upon this land, a still, small 
voice is heard, which startles you like Moses on 
the Mount of Horeb, with these solemn words : 
" Put off thy shoes from off thy feet, the place 
whereon thou standest is holy ground " 

This region, specially holy, is before me. To - 
morrow, after a journey of a few hours, I shall 
tread its dust; I shall see its hills; I shall 
survey its majestic horizon. How often have 
my thoughts been directed to this mysterious 
country; how often, with all believing hearts, 
have I mused upon a pilgrimage to the Holy 
Land, as the summit of the earthly joys that 
can be asked for from God; and to-morrow I 
shall begin the pious pilgrimage; to-morrow 
my foot will tread upon the remains of the 
ancient way on which the foot of my Saviour 
trod when he passed through the villages of 
Upper Galilee. I shall pass by Sepphoris, a 
country to which Jesus belonged, through 
Joachim and Anna, his ancestors according to 
the flesh. At Nazareth I shall prostrate myself 
in the solitary grotto where the angel announced 
to Mary the wonderful mystery of the Incar- 
nation, and I shall bring to life upon the altar, 
in celebrating the awful sacrifice, him who, by 
the operation of the Holy Spirit, descended into 



ANTICIPATED JOYS. 



357 



the chaste womb of a Virgin. Here the Word 
became flesh. 

To-morrow, then, will be a high day in my 
life, as a priest and a Christian. I have the 
anticipation of the joys which await me. Hap- 
pier than those who, in vain, asked of the Lord 
to cross the Jordan, and to stand upon the 
sacred land, and who obtained as a special favour 
to cast a glance upon it from the summit of 
Pisgah, I shall not only have seen the verdant 
Carmel, whose high top now bounds the horizon 
before me, the last slopes of the mountains of 
Galilee, which hide Nazareth from my sight; 
to-morrow I shall take possession of the pro- 
mised land, to fill my soul with rapture, during 
long days of travels and researches, with biblical 
memorials, with impressions of faith, aspirations 
towards God on the very spots that God has 
touched, — a life after which one asks no more 
from Providence than the happiness of contem- 
plating him in the eternal country at the end of 
this pilgrimage here below. 



APPENDIX. 



APPENDIX. 



I peomised to insert at the end of this volume 
the reply of the Eastern Church to the Encyclical 
Letter of His Holiness Pius IX. This document is 
very important for settling the opinion of Catholics 
on the respective position of the two churches. It 
may, therefore, be advantageously studied as a 
summary of the theology of those Orientals who 
are still separated from Rome. 

It must, however, be remembered, that the 
Armenian church, which is very influential in the 
East, does not make such exclusive pretensions as 
the Greek. This point I shall show more fully in 
my second volume. The members of this commu- 
nion that I have seen do not treat Catholicism 
with the same stiffness as the Greeks have shown 
in their answer. I shall give as much information 
as possible upon this weighty question. 



362 



APPENDIX. 



Reply of the Orthodox Eastern Church, to the 
Encyclical Letter of Pope Pius IX., addressed 
by His Holiness in January 1848, to the 
Orthodox Greek Christians. 

The Orthodox Eastern Church, in spite of all the 
storms which have disturbed her for many cen- 
turies, and even do to the present time, — in spite of 
all the sufferings she has had to undergo, and her 
struggles against various temptations, still survives. 
She has undergone vicissitudes, and endured aggres- 
sions ; but by the visible protection of her invisible 
Protector, she is kept firmly upon the immovable 
rock of the faith. 

Thesis I. 

The blessed Pope Pius IX, after having spoken 
at some length in his encyclical letter to those who 
have constantly continued in the communion and 
faith of his see, addresses to all the orthodox 
Eastern Christians some words of peace and love 
(as he says), and of anxiety for those of us who, 
although we worship Jesus Christ, are yet alienated 
from the see of St. Peter. He adds that, after the 
example of Christ, he wishes to bring back the lost 
sheep into the Lord's fold. Addressing those who 
discharge the high ecclesiastical functions (not, how- 
ever, mentioning the name of Patriarch), he re- 
minds them of the ancient state of our churches, 
when they were closely connected with the other 



APPENDIX. 



363 



churches in the world, and asks them what benefit 
thej have found in the dissensions which have arisen 
up in consequence of this separation, and have 
brought it to pass that the pastors of the East 
differ on the subject of doctrine and sacred autho- 
rity, not only from the churches of the West, but 
also from one another ? 

Reply. 

The Eastern Church, its pastors, and all orthodox 
Christians, return their thanks to Pius IX, for his 
anxiety to bring back the lost sheep into the fold. 
It is, indeed, a sacred duty incumbent upon his 
Eminence to recall the thousands who have sepa- 
rated from Rome, and have broken off their union 
with her. But in the case of the orthodox Eastern 
Christians, his zeal is entirely misplaced. For he 
himself is well acquainted with the ancient union 
in which the two sisters were, for eight consecutive 
centuries, connected by the same spirit and by the 
same profession of faith. Nor is he either ignorant 
of the grounds — not frivolous but weighty ones 
(because a Divine truth was then at stake), in 
consequence of which the Western Church, by per- 
sisting in her innovations, broke the sacred bond 
which united her to the Eastern, while the latter 
made no alteration in her primitive institutions, 
neither before nor after the change of her political 
position — a providential arrangement. She pre- 
serves, unaltered, her ancient character ; the clergy 
discharge the duties incumbent upon their respective 



:3G4 



APPENDIX. 



orders ; the holy sacraments are everywhere ad- 
ministered ; and in one word, the Eastern Church 
has firmly kept, and still keeps, unchanged, and in 
their primitive purity, all the doctrines she has 
received from the apostles themselves and the holy 
fathers, who were divinely inspired ; she has made 
no innovation upon these doctrines ; she will main- 
tain them for ever, without contention, curtailment, 
or division, in points of doctrine and pastoral union ; 
although she is undeservedly slandered, and re- 
proached with doing the contrary. 

Thesis II. 

Farther on, in his encyclical letter, Pius IX bids 
the Eastern Christians remember the Creed and the 
one holy Catholic (universal) and apostolic Church, 
which they refuse to acknowledge, when they deny 
that the Roman Church is such. 

Reply. 

The members of the Catholic and orthodox 
Eastern Church receive and revere the sacred sum- 
mary of those truths which are contained in sound 
and pure doctrine. St. Cyril of Jerusalem, in his 
18 th homily to the catechumens, treating upon the 
sacred creed, says : "The church is called Catholic, 
because it extends throughout the universe ; and 
because Catholic doctrine, in all its points, and with 
no omissions, is taught within its bosom. The 
church, therefore, which contains all truths, with no 
omissions, and without the least alteration, is one 



APPENDIX. 



365 



and holy, by reason of the unity and holiness of its 
only head— our Lord Jesus Christ. The pastors of 
the primitive apostolical church under the govern- 
ment of this head, together with the churches which 
were lawfully subordinate to them, and with others 
which remained independent, lived in peaceable 
union and unanimity. So also, by the purity of 
faith, and by observance of the canons of the 
apostles and councils, do all the orthodox Eastern 
Christians form a well organized body, — a holy 
Catholic and apostolic church. 

Thesis III. 

In the next place, to establish the sovereignty of 
the bishops of Rome, the usual arguments are ad- 
vanced in this letter, such as, 1st, The gift of the 
keys to the Apostle Peter ; 2nd, The indefectibility 
of his faith ; 3rd, The command to strengthen his 
brethren ; and, 4th, To feed the sheep of Jesus 
Christ. 

Reply. 

The words addressed by our Lord Jesus Christ 
to St. Peter : " Thou art Peter, &c.," were equally 
so to the other apostles. " Whatsoever ye shall 
bind on earth shall be bound in heaven," (Matt, 
xviii. 18). The words, "On this rock will I build 
my church," were equally said of all the apostles, 
and even of the prophets. " Built upon the foun- 
dation of the apostles and prophets" (Ephes. ii. 20). 
" And the wall of the city had twelve foundations, 



366 



APPENDIX. 



and in them the names of the twelve apostles of 
the Lamb" (Rev. xxi. 14). Now the words just 
quoted lead us to the conclusion that Jesus Christ 
alone is the chief stone in the foundation of the 
apostles, and of the whole church. "Jesus Christ 
himself being the chief corner-stone/' (Ephes. ii. 20). 
It is true that it was to St. Peter that the Lord 
said : " Thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will 
build mj church " (Matt. xvi. 18) ; but it was only 
because St. Peter anticipated the other apostles in 
this confession : " Thou art the Christ, the son of 
the living God." As to the sense of the words, 
" And upon this rock I will build mj church/' St. 
Augustine (besides the Eastern fathers) explains 
them as follows : " Thou art Peter," says Christ, 
" and upon this rock that thou hast confessed, upon 
this rock that thou hast acknowledged, by saying : 
Thou art the Christ, the son of the living God, 
I will build my church : it is not upon thine own 
self, but indeed upon me that thou mayest build 
the church, which is my body." But those who 
wished to lay their foundation upon men, said : 
' As for me, I am of Paul, and I of Apollos, and I 
of Cephas" (1 Cor. i. 12). Now the exposition of 
the blessed Western father shows us, in the first 
place, that the rock upon which the church was 
founded is not the apostle Peter, but the apostle's 
confession of faith — Jesus Christ himself. " That 
rock was Christ" (1 Cor. x. 4) ; in the second 
place, that those who persist in saying : " I am of 
Cephas (of Peter) : it is Peter that I respect exclu- 



APPENDIX. 



367 



sively, and acknowledge as the head of all the holy 
fathers and of the church herself," — those men, in 
the words of St. Paul and of St. Augustine, divide 
Christ, and build upon a human foundation. 

As to the special prayer of Christ for Peter that 
his faith might no more fail : " I have prayed for 
thee that thy faith fail not, and when thou art 
converted, strengthen thy brethren" (Luke xxii. 
32), the fathers give very clear explanations upon 
this point ; as Basil, Chrysostom, Augustine, Am- 
brose, Epiphanius, Macarius, JEgyptus, Titus of 
Bostra, Theophylact, and Cyril of Alexandria. 
Jesus Christ, in his wonderful prayer to his hea- 
venly Father, which we read in the seventeenth 
chapter of St. John, prayed generally for all the 
apostles, and for those that should believe on him 
through their word. If then he prayed for Peter 
especially, it was because he foresaw that even he 
who uttered these presumptuous words : " Though 
all men shall be offended because of thee, yet will 
I never be offended" (Matt. xxvi. 33), would deny 
his master, and thus deeply fall. But after this, 
having too much confidence in his own strength, 
and after having broken the promise he had made, 
fear took hold of him, and he was guilty of denying 
his master. Christ prayed, not that the faith of 
Peter might not waver (for this had already come 
to pass as a punishment for his presumptuous 
words), but that it might not entirely fail and die, 
so far as to reduce him to despair in consequence 
of his denial ; and that Peter, having washed away 



368 



APPENDIX. 



his sin by repentance, and been converted to his 
former faith, might become a salutary example of 
restoration for all other brethren whose faith might 
waver. 

Immediately after the above words were uttered 
by the Lord, not to show the supremacy of St. 
Peter, but to preserve him from the despair to 
which the enormous sin he had committed might 
reduce him (a truth which is well set forth by the 
fathers and is self-evident), the encyclical letter, to 
justify the power that the Bishops of Rome have 
arrogated to themselves, advanced the ordinary 
arguments, in a well-known order, which the 
Eastern church has centuries ago triumphantly 
refuted in writing. 

Thesis IV. 

Jesus Christ expressly charged St. Peter to feed 
his lambs and sheep ; he therefore entrusted to 
his care the whole church, which consists of true 
lambs and sheep of Jesus Christ, and this care now 
devolves upon the sovereign pontiffs of Rome, &c. 

Reply. 

To explain this point we think it will be enough 
to say as follows : The threefold question, addressed 
by our Lord to St. Peter, is a command rather 
than anything else ; for this reason no allusion is 
made to any power, but to a sacred duty, strictly 
laid upon all the Lord's ministers. "Feed the 
flock of God which is among you" (1 Peter v. 2). 



APPENDIX. 



369 



Let those who pretend that in this command given 
to St. Peter there is a reference to some mysterious 
prerogative, consult the works of the holy fathers, 
Augustine, Ambrose, Ohrysostom, Epiphanius, and 
Cyril of Alexandria ; they will then see what 
meaning the fathers put on these words. 

For the sake of brevity we will cite here only 
the words of the first-mentioned of these fathers. 
St. Augustine says, by the thrice-repeated confes- 
sion of St. Peter: "Yea, Lord, thou knowest that I 
love thee," the sin of the threefold denial is blotted 
out, and the apostolate of St. Peter is restored ; 
this was done to remove the idea that might be 
entertained that the apostolate would be weakened 
by the denial into which Peter fell from frailty of 
human nature. With this explanation before our 
eyes, we must read the sacred words of the gospel 
in the sense of the old fathers of the church. Jesus 
says to Simon Peter : " Simon, son of Jonas, lovest 
thou me more than these V that is, Do you who 
formerly boasted, and said : " Though all men shall 
be offended because of thee, yet will I never be 
offended," — do you, I say, love me more than the 
other apostles ? Peter, properly taught by painful 
experience, no longer dares tell Jesus that he loves 
him more than the other apostles, but he says in 
reply only : " Yea, Lord, thou knowest that I love 
thee." Jesus Christ having received this humble 
answer, does not keep on requiring more love from 
Peter than from the rest — a thing which Peter had 
formerly boasted of — but simply asks him of love. 

2 B 



370 



APPENDIX. 



"Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me'?" To this 
Peter humbly gave the same answer ; but having 
been questioned the third time, Peter remembered 
his threefold denial, and was not without reason 
grieved. "Peter was grieved because he said unto 
him the third time, Lovest thou me" (John xxi. 17). 
It follows, consequently, that St. Peter saw in this 
triple interrogation, not any prerogative but rather 
a humiliation, remorse for his denial being in his 
mind. 

In like manner the threefold command of our 
Lord to St. Peter: "Feed my lambs and my sheep," 
is not a summary charge to rule the church, nor 
any other extraordinary commission, as the sup- 
porters of Rome take it to be, by explaining this 
saying in a very arbitrary manner. To bring out 
the truth more clearly, we will quote the testimony 
of the Western fathers, and, in the first place, that 
of St. Ambrose. The Apostle Peter, he says, after 
his fall, which proceeded from the weakness of 
human nature, was thrice questioned because of his 
threefold denial. The first question, " Lovest thou 
roel" is an allusion to his love before the cross; 
the second, to his love for the flock ; and the third 
is the expression of the pardon of his sin. (De Sac. 
lib. ii. c. 7.) In the second place, we shall cite 
the following passage of St. Augustine : " Thrice 
fear denied, thrice love confessed." Would you 
know the meaning of the Lord's command, " Feed 
my sheep" \ know then, that to feed is to teach and 
nourish with spiritual food (Homil. V. in Evang. 



ft 



APPENDIX. 371 

Joh.) Such, then, is the explanation of the fathers, 
such the interpretation of this passage which is 
given bj the primitive Catholic and orthodox church. 

A passage of St. Irenseus (Contra. Hser. lib. iii. 
c. 4.) is afterwards quoted in the encyclical letter, 
and arbitrarily mutilated as follows : 

Thesis V. 

St. Irenseus, in appealing to the doctrine of the 
Apostles against the heretics of his age, considers 
that it is useless to enumerate the traditions of all 
the churches which have an apostolic origin, but 
asserts that it is enough to cite against them the 
doctrine of the Roman church, and says the whole 
church, that is, all the faithful in the whole world, 
must rally round the Church of Rome on account 
of the pre-eminence of this church, in which the 
tradition received from the Apostles has been pre- 
served on all matters believed by the faithful. 

Reply. 

The words of St. Irenseus against the Gnostic 
heretics, in their original and unaltered text, are as 
follows : "As it would be too long [but not 'useless' 
as the Pope has it] to enumerate the traditions of 
all the churches, we shall silence any one who 

* The work of Irenseus has reached us chieny hi c a Latin 
translation, the text of which is very corrupt. See Neander, 
vol. i. p. 273; Gieseler, vol. i. p. 159 English translation 
in "For. Theological Library," Edinburgh. — Tr. 

2 b 2 



372 



APPENDIX. 



carries his speculations beyond due bounds, no 
otherwise than bj considering the tradition of the 
Apostles and the faith preached to men ; and come 
down to our days, as it has been preserved in the 
great, ancient, and well-known Church, established 
at Rome by the two illustrious Apostles Peter and 
Paul [not by Peter only]. With this church, on 
account of its very firm foundation, the whole 
church must agree, that is to say, the faithful in all 
the world, for there has ever been preserved, down 
to my time, the traditions of the Apostles." 

In what a pitiful manner have the words of the 
holy father been mutilated ! The words " the whole 
church must agree " (the mutilators leaving out the 
context), have been transformed into the following: 
" The faithful must rally round the Church of 
Rome on account of its pre-eminence." This pre- 
eminence was not then invented, and the blessed 
Irenaaus knew nothing about it. Having to argue 
with the Gnostics, he addressed the churches of 
the West, subordinated to Rome, and combatting 
these heretics with the ancient tradition, that is to 
say, with the tradition given to all the churches 
by the Apostles, St. Irenseus passes by in silence 
other churches on account of their great number, 
and refers only to the Church of Rome, in the 
patriarchate of which he was a bishop. There was 
then no other sovereign city. The church of ancient 
Rome had the primacy of honour over the Western 
churches subordinated to her, and on this account 
is mentioned by IrenaBiis. Further, the holy father 



APPENDIX. 



373 



cites in the same chapter not only the Church of 
Rome, but also those of Ephesus and Smyrna. 
Had he acknowledged the supreme authority of the 
Bishop of Rome only, he would, in his controversy 
with the Gnostics, have cited only this church, with- 
out mentioning any other. But he acknowledged 
the other churches as equals of Rome, and as of 
the same authority ; for this reason, he, together 
with the neighbouring bishops, induced Pope Victor 
not to excommunicate the Christians of Asia, and, 
at the same time rebuked him for having done so 
on account of a difference in the period of the 
celebration of Easter, and not to make a schism in 
the churches on such an unimportant difference. 

At the time when the two churches of the East 
and the West were united together, as much by 
purity of doctrine as by Christian love and union ; 
at this time, we say, the bishops of the Eastern 
church, more than once, when unjust attacks were 
made upon them, solicited help from the pious 
Bishops of Rome, whom they looked upon as pri- 
mates, in respect of their see and precedence. 
However, after the schism of the two churches, the 
Bishops of Rome with undue presumption, and no 
longer content with the primacy of their position, 
presumed to arrogate supremacy over the whole 
church. On this account, in page 9 of the ency- 
clical letter, directly after the passage of St. Irenseus 
just cited, it is set forth, as a very important 
argument for the supremacy of the bishops of 
Rome, that the Eastern bishops have solicited help 



374 



APPENDIX. 



at their hands; and, first of all, Athanasius the 
Great, of whom it is said : 

Thesis VI. 

Athanasius, Bishop of Alexandria, when he was 
unjustly condemned and driven from his see, came 
to Rome. Now Julius, Bishop of Rome, took 
cognizance of each man's case (for other bishops 
unjustly driven by the Arians from their sees, like- 
wise came to Rome), and having found them all 
faithful to the Nicene creed, because they thought 
the same as he did, he admitted them to com- 
munion. And as by reason of the pre-eminence of 
the Holy See, the care of all is incumbent upon 
him, he restored them to their churches, &c. 

Reply. 

iUhanasius the Great, who suffered so much for 
religion, after he had been calumniated and con- 
demned by the Arian bishops, headed by his sworn 
enemy, Eusebius of Nicomedia, repaired to Rome 
to Constantine, Emperor of the West, and to Pope 
Julius, for he knew that the Roman church was 
opposed to the Arians, and preserved in its integ- 
rity the creed of Nicsea. And did Julius, when he 
pleaded the cause of Athanasius, who was unjustly 
condemned, express himself to the orthodox and 
Arians as their head in terms like these : — " This is 
the will of the Church of Rome, by reason of the 
keys of St. Peter/' or in other terms equally pre- 
sumptuous 1 on the contrary, he wrote to them 



APPENDIX 



375 



modestly, and showed himself mindful of the union 
between the churches. To prove the unlawful con- 
secration of Gregory as the successor of Athanasius, 
he does not say that the sanction of the Pope 
ought, first of all, to have been asked, and only 
after that ought Athanasius to be deprived and 
Gregory to be ordained, but he simply says that 
the Eastern church would have done well to have 
conferred with the Western on this matter, that all 
might have together decided what was required by 
justice, seeing that those who were unjustly . dealt 
with were bishops of churches which had been 
founded by the apostles in person, i Pope Julius, 
moreover, says in respect of this letter to the 
Eastern church, that he wrote it in pursuance of a 
decision of a council held at Rome. " For," he says, 
" although I alone have signed the letter, the 
opinion is -not mine alone, but that also of the other 
bishops of Italy, and the neighbouring countries." 
And as in this letter, Julius considers not himself 
but the council as the judge, no conclusion in favour 
of ecclesiastical supremacy can be deduced there- 
from, nor as to the right of supreme jurisdiction. 
(Athanas. Apol. 2, Socrates, and others.) In one 
word, it was not the Bishop of Rome who restored 
Athanasius to his see, and permitted him to return 
to Alexandria, but Oonstantine, through the en- 
treaties and even threats on the part of Oonstans. 
(Socrates, lib. 2.) 

After this, the encyclical letter says as follows of 
St. Chrysostoni : 



376 



APPENDIX. 



Thesis VII. 
John Chrysostom, Archbishop of Constantinople, 
who was wrongfully condemned by the council of 
Chalcedon, had recourse to the Apostolic See by 
letters and envoys, and was acquitted, our prede- 
cessor Innocent I. haying proved his innocence. 

Reply. 

St. John Chrysostom, that man of God, having 
been deprived of his see by the council which was 
convoked by wicked men, at a villa near Chalcedon. 
called The Oak, wrote concerning these unjust 
attacks against him (but he never sent legates), 
not only to Pope Innocent, but also to other 
bishops, such as Flavian of Antioch, John of Jeru- 
salem, Eulogius of Antioch, Theodosius of Scytho- 
polis, to the bishops of Macedonia, and last of all 
to Aurelius, Bishop of Carthage in Africa. (Sozomen, 
lib. 8, c. 24. Chrysostom's Letters, 37, 91, 
95.) Innocent, who was solicited by Chrysostom 
to convene an oecumenical council to inquire into 
the calumnies of which he was the victim, and to 
pronounce judgment after inquiry, did all he could 
to convoke an oecumenical council; but all his efforts 
notwithstanding the concurrence of Honorius, Em- 
peror of the West, had no result. The envoys 
whom the Pope sent to Byzantium, became em- 
broiled with some members of the court of Arca- 
dius and Eudoxia, and were sent back in disgrace 
as though they had come only to trouble a foreign 



APPENDIX. 



377 



government. St. Chrysostom they succeeded in 
banishing to a greater distance, viz., to Pityus, in 
Colchis. (Letter 2 of Ohrys. to Innocent. Sozom., 
lib. 6, last chapter.) This is the true account, 
founded upon and attested by good evidence ; it 
"will be seen that it differs greatly from the Romish 
version of the matter, which has been taken from 
false histories, and altered facts. This account 
shows us then that the holy father wrote about 
what had happened to him not only to the Bishop 
of Rome, but also to other bishops, and that both 
Chrysostom and Innocent (and nothing can be 
clearer than this) acknowledged the supreme autho- 
rity of the oecumenical council which they en- 
deavoured to convoke. 

In order to establish more fully the absolute 
supremacy of the Bishop of Rome, from their 
primacy in question, the encyclical letter, by way 
of supplement to what has been before said in it, 
puts forth the following : 

Thesis VIII. 

Another example of the respect of your fathers 
for the supremacy of the Bishops of Rome, is met 
with in the council of Chalcedon (451). The 
bishops assembled there, about six hundred in 
number, who, with some few exceptions, belonged 
to the East ; after the letters (read the letter) from 
Leo the Great, Sovereign Pontiff of Rome, had been 
read, cried out in the second act of the council : 



378 



APPENDIX. 



" It is St. Peter has thus spoken by the mouth of 
Leo/' &c. 

Reply. 

The letter of Pope Leo to the fourth oecumenical 
council which was convened at Chalcedon, though 
quite orthodox, had notwithstanding to undergo a 
mature examination, whether it were or were not 
in conformity with the creed of the first aud second 
oecumenical councils, and also with the profession of 
faith made by St. Cyril at the third oecumenical 
council, as is shown by the acts of the above-men- 
tioned fourth council. After the deliberations upon 
the letter were finished, Anatolius of Constantinople 
having been asked whether it were orthodox and 
in agreement with the decrees of the oecumenical 
councils, replied that it fully agreed both with the 
creeds of the 318 and 150 fathers, and with that 
decreed upon by St. Cyril at the council of Ephesus. 
So you see that it was not from Leo's letter, which 
the father had examined, that judgment was pro- 
nounced upon the heresy of Eutyches, and an end 
put to the troubles which it had called forth, but 
from the decrees of the councils of Nicasa, Constan- 
tinople, and Ephesus. Now which is superior, he 
who is examined and judged, or he who examines 
and judges 1 Leo, although an orthodox and holy 
man, said nothing in his letter to the council con- 
cerning his headship, but only set forth in his pro- 
fession of faith what the fathers had already said 
in the preceding councils. It is therefore utterly 



APPENDIX. 



379 



impossible to deduce from it any conclusion in 
favour of the absolute supremacy, as the Romans 
imagine can be done, when they fall back upon the 
letter of St. Leo to the fourth council. If this 
letter has been called the pillar of orthodoxy, the 
letters of the eastern bishops to their patriarch, 
Tarasius, were equally called by the fathers at the 
seventh oecumenical council, " the pillar of piety," as 
the letter of Tarasius to the eastern bishops was 
called " the rule of orthodoxy." Now the pillar of 
orthodoxy, the pillar of piety, and the rule of 
orthodoxy, are one and the same thing. 

When the fathers at the fourth council requested 
that the letter from St. Cyril of Alexandria might 
be read, and the letter had been read, the council 
exclaimed : " So does St. Cyril believe, so do we 
believe ; may the memory of St. Cyril live for 
ever !" Then, when St. Leo's letter had also been 
read, the fathers exclaimed again : " This is the 
faith of the fathers of the church ; it is that of 
the Apostles. So Peter hath spoken by the mouth 
of Leo." Thereupon they added : " Thus did the 
Apostles teach." All this proves plainly, that the 
fathers acknowledged Leo as orthodox, on account of 
the perfect agreement between his creed and the doc- 
trine of Cyril. Now Cyril's letter having given no 
supremacy to Cyril, neither did Leo's letter give 
any to Leo. 



380 



APPENDIX. 



Thesis IX. 

The Bishops of Rome obtained the first rank in 
the councils, and especially in the oecumenical 
councils, and their authority was appealed to, both 
before and after the institution of councils. We 
might, independently of councils, cite several other 
acts and writings of the fathers and ancient eastern 
writers, which prove that the supremacy of the 
Bishops of Rome was firmly established in the East 
in the time of your ancestors, &c, (page 10). 

Reply. 

In the first place, not one of the seven oecume- 
nical councils was convened by the pretended power 
of the sovereign pontiffs of Rome, to which (as 
Catholics say) recourse would have been had either 
before or after the convocation of the councils ; 
but, as is shown both by the acts and history of the 
councils, these sacred assemblies were convened 
expressly and particularly by the supreme autho- 
rity and absolute power of the orthodox emperors 
of the East, who summoned the bishops both of 
the East and West to take part in the councils, 
either in person, or by their representatives. To 
prove that the consent of the Pope was never 
required before convening the oecumenical councils, 
and that the legates of the Bishops of Rome did 
not attend the council as invested with supreme 
power, but did so with submission, we think the 
following facts will suffice. The legates whom 



APPENDIX, 



381 



Pope Agatho sent to the sixth oecumenical council 
said to the Emperor Constantine Pogonatus : " Sire, 
in pursuance of the order issued by jour Majesty to 
our very holy pope, we are sent to you, under the care 
and protection of God, as the bearers of a commu- 
nication from His Holiness." This communication 
was in these terms : — " In consequence of a pious 
order of your clemency, under the protection of 
God, out of obedience to which we are bound, and 
not from boldness, we send you our fellow- 
labourers ; and kneeling in spirit before you, we 
humbly entreat your clemency to honour them 
with a gracious welcome." (First Act of the 6th 
Council.) Pope Adrian, when he sent his legates 
to the seventh oecumenical council, wrote as follows 
to the Emperor Constantine and to Irene : — " Most 
pious and benignant sovereigns, it is with very 
cordial love that I entreat your kindness, and as 
though I did so in person, kneeling before you, 
and falling at your feet, I beseech, exhort, and 
conjure you, in the presence of God, to restore the 
holy images, and to let them be worshipped accord- 
ing to the ancient rule, in the capital and in both 
parts of Greece. (Act 2 of the 7th Council.) 

As to the supremacy which has caused so much 
noise and discussion, to which the Bishop of Rome 
makes such great pretensions, which he so far 
elevates and exalts as to threaten those who dispute 
it, we may truly say that it cannot be proved from 
the works of the Eastern fathers, and that the 
Eastern church lias never acknowledged it, not- 



382 



APPENDIX. 



withstanding what the Bishops of Rome say on the 
point. According to the conclusive canons of the 
seven oecumenical councils, held before the schism 
of the churches, the Eastern church, its chief 
bishop, and its four orthodox patriarchs, awarded 
nothing to the Bishops of Rome, excepting the 
primacy of honour, but connected therewith no idea 
of primacy or sovereignty over the whole Christian 
church. 

The sixth canon of the first oecumenical council 
says as follows : — " Let the ancient customs re- 
ceived in Egypt, Lybia, and at Pantapolis, be main- 
tained, according to which the Bishop of Alexandria 
has authority over all the bishops of these coun- 
tries. The Bishop of Rome has a similar prero- 
gative. The prerogatives conferred upon churches 
of Antioch, as well as of other places, are likewise 
to be maintained." 

The canon we have just cited shows us very 
plainly the authority of the Bishop of Rome was, 
in all respects, equal to that of the Bishops of 
Alexandria, Antioch, and other sees. From this 
it is clear that the first oecumenical council was 
far from acknowledging, in the Bishop of Rome, 
the power of absolute supremacy over the universal 
church, or, what comes to the same thing, the 
dignity of the head of the church. 

The third canon of the second oecumenical coun- 
cil prescribes — " Let the Bishop of Constantinople 
have the primacy of honour, after the Bishop of 
Rome, because Constantinople is New Rome. Ad- 



APPENDIX, 



383 



mitting that, it might be asked whether the Bishop 
of Rome has simply the primacy of honour, and 
no supreme and universal authority. We must, 
then, be very attentive to the meaning of the canon 
of the council according to which the Bishop of 
Constantinople follows immediately after the Bishop 
of Rome. The cause is, that Constantinople is New 
Rome. Why, then, does the Bishop of Rome take 
precedence over the Bishop of Constantinople. Be- 
cause he is Bishop of ancient Rome. From this it 
may, therefore, be concluded, that the second coun- 
cil awarded to the Bishop of Rome the prerogative 
of antiquity, and not an exclusive power. 

After having established the ancient rights and 
independence of the Bishops of Cyprus and of 
other bishops, which had been violated, and limited 
the power of each to their respective episcopates, 
giving them no right to extend it beyond those 
limits, the third oecumenical council, to prevent 
similar abuses in future, decreed as follows : — " Let 
not the order of the fathers be infringed upon ; 
let not the arrogance of temporal power creep in 
by stealth, under pretence of sacred acts, so far as 
to deprive us, little by little, without our perceiving 
it, of the liberty that the liberator of all men, our 
Lord Jesus Christ, has mercifully given us, at the 
cost of his blood. (Can. viii.) 

This sacred council, therefore, instead of approv- 
ing or admitting the absolute authority of bishops 
(such as the Roman church attributes to the Pope,) 
on the contrary, expressly rejected it. Nor did 



384 



APPENDIX. 



the council fail to take great care that a like arro- 
gance of authority should not, in time, show itself 
among the pastors of the church. 

The twenty-eighth canon of the fourth oecume- 
nical council says : " Observing in all things the 
decrees of the holy fathers, and acknowledging the 
canon of the 550 pious bishops which has just been 
read (the third in the second council), we appoint 
and accord the same privileges to the most holy 
church of Constantinople, the New Rome. For the 
fathers, with reason, accorded to the see of ancient 
Rome the privileges that she enjoys, because it was 
the seat of government. For the same reason the 
550 bishops of the second general council deter- 
mined that New Rome, which has the honour of 
being the seat of empire and the senate, should 
have the same advantages in the order of the 
church, and be the second to it. (Labbe, torn. iv. 
p. 769). 

According to the decree of this council, we must 
equally pay attention, in the first place, to the fact 
that the sacred council, although awarding certain 
prerogatives to the Bishop of Rome, solely on ac- 
count of the importance of this city, does not 
acknowledge in him, however, the extraordinary 
power of which this bishop presumptuously boasts 
in our times ; in the second place, that the second 
as well as the third oecumenical council accorded 
to the see of New Rome the same prerogatives as 
to the aucicnt see. Hence it follows, that if the 
Bishop of Rome obtained precedency and the pri- 



APPENDIX. 



385 



macy of honour over the Bishop of Constantinople, 
it was only because it would be impossible for these 
two bishops each to be first at the same time, not 
because the Bishop of Rome had any prerogative 
of authority, or of particular and exclusive power, 
in respect to the universal church. The Bishop of 
Constantinople, therefore, exercised the same power 
in New Rome as the Bishop of Rome in the ancient 
city. The same thing must be said of the three 
other patriarchs of the Eastern church, who, when 
they were together at councils, and in some other 
cases, always gave to the bishops of Rome and of 
Constantinople, the primacy of position and of pre- 
cedence, but of nothing else. 

Having republished what had been already or- 
dered and decreed by the foregoing councils, con- 
cerning the sees of the patriarchs, the sixth oecume- 
nical council adds, in its thirty-sixth canon : " In 
republishing what was ordained by the 550 fathers 
assembled in this seat of government, which has 
been preserved by God, as well as by the 630 
fathers assembled at Chalcedon, we decree that the 
see of Constantinople has the same prerogative as 
the see of ancient Rome ; and that as it is the 
second see it takes the lead, like the former, in 
ecclesiastical matters; and that after it, in the 
following order, come, the see of the great city of 
Alexandria, that of Antioch, and lastly that of 
Jerusalem. 

In compliance with this decree of the council, 
the bishop of Constantinople, as is the Eastern 



386 



APPENDIX. 



custom, is called Patriarch; and the Bishop of 
Rome, according to the custom of the Western 
church, is called Pope; as the Bishop of Alex- 
andria, according to ancient custom, is also called 
Pope. 

Let any man, who wishes to be impartial, fall 
back upon the decisive arguments we have just set 
forth, which have been taken from the oecumenical 
councils, at which were present, or took part, 
either by word of mouth or by consent, the blessed 
popes of that time, and himself judge how far it is 
from the truth that the pretended supremacy would 
have had any force in the East with our holy 
fathers, or, which comes to the same thing, in these 
oecumenical councils. But Rome has formed a 
habit, which is a favourite and common one with 
her, of understanding things in an unusual way, 
and according to her o\yu will, of interpreting 
things falsely and altering their sense. 

A like primacy, — either as a head of the church, 
as an absolute authority, or as a centre of true 
faith, — was, therefore, never known or acknow- 
ledged in the person of a bishop by the Christian 
church, considering that the bishops of the primi- 
tive church are known to have had always in mind 
the words of the Lord : " Whosoever will be great 
among you, let him be your minister ; and whosoever 
will be chief among you, let him be your servant." 
(Matt. xx. 26, 27.) And as every bishop, in 
obedience to this divine commandment, acknow- 
ledged himself as the servant of his brethren, no 

I 



APPENDIX. 



387 



one, duriDg the lifetime of the apostles and the 
apostolic fathers, ever dreamt of primacy or supre- 
macy over the others. Moreover, the churches of 
the most illustrious cities of that time, in which 
were a greater number of believers, and especially 
the bishops of the churches whose succession was 
traced back to the apostles, acquired over other 
neighbouring but less famous churches such prero- 
gatives as made them a kind of refuge for them. 
Of this kind were the churches of Antioch, the 
bishops of which were ordained by the Apostles 
Peter and Paul ; of Alexandria, founded by the 
Evangelist Mark ; and of Rome, founded by the 
Apostles Peter and Paul together. Then the order 
of the oecumenical councils required one of the 
three bishops of the illustrious churches we have 
just mentioned to have the primacy of honour, and 
that precedence should be granted to him. On 
this account, in accordance with the canon of the 
council, the fathers did not err in granting the 
primacy to the see of ancient Rome as the seat of 
government. We, holding steadfastly to the words 
of the canon of the fourth oecumenical council just 
quoted : " The fathers have given the primacy," do 
not hesitate to add, as an indisputable conclusion, 
that these prerogatives were given to the bishops of 
Rome neither by the Apostles, nor by the Lord 
himself. And since the body of Roman bishops 
can nowise be acknowledged as the church of 
Christ, that church cannot either accept them as 
its head \ for, from the words of Holy Writ, and 

2 c 2 



388 APPENDIX. 

according to the expression of St. Paul, no one, 
besides Jesus Christ, can be chief and head of the 
church. — (Ephes. iv. 8 — 15.) 

And as the Romans, to prove the supremacy of 
the popes, bring forward the epistle of St. Clement 
to the Corinthians — we must say that this proves 
nothing. For in ancient times, as we have already 
said, the churches with the fewest believers applied 
in matters of faith and controversy, and in dissen- 
sions, to the bishops of the most illustrious cities. 
Now of this kind was the church of Rome, not, 
however, by virtue of the right which its bishops 
arrogate, to pronounce a linal decision upon the 
affairs of the whole Christian Church — a right, 
which, being only of recent invention, was not 
known in the church of the second century. 

St. Clement of Rome addressed to Corinth an 
admonition, which tended to put an end to the evil, 
and to lead the Corinthians to live in peace and 
unanimity. Dionysius, the famous bishop of Corinth, 
under Antoninus Yerus, a holy man, a disciple of 
the apostolical fathers, distinguished for his erudi- 
tion and untiring activity, — he also, not to mention 
several other bishops, wrote to several churches, 
and thus made himself most useful to foreign 
churches. His instructions and epistles were re- 
splendent with great erudition ; and excited in 
many churches a desire to ask him for other epistles, 
as he supplied not milk but strong meat. In the 
primitive times of the Christian church, therefore, 
divinely inspired men did not address epistles of 



APPENDIX. 



389 



this kind to the churches from ambition, but in obe- 
dience to the words of the divine apostle, for the 
edification and perfection of the Lord's flock 
scattered abroad. (Ephes. iv. 12.) 

Thesis X. 

We, children of the Eastern Church, thank His 
Holiness for his earnest invitations to us, to be con- 
verted without delay, and unite ourselves to his see, 
which he believes to be the. true foundation of the 
real Christian church. 

Reply. 

In the first place, we assert that the Christian 
church, from its institution, has never acknow- 
ledged, nor does acknowledge at present (as we 
have sufficiently shown above) , St. Peter, nor any 
man, as the foundation. It acknowledges Jesus 
Christ as the first stone of the foundation. " For 
other foundation can no man lay than that which 
is Jesus Christ.'' — 1 Cor. iii. 11. 

In the second place, the encyclical letter says 
that the Easterns voluntarily separated themselves 
from the firm rock on which the Church of Rome 
lias been built : that is to say, that the church of 
the East has separated herself from that of the 
West. 

But for this to be said with justice and truth, 
proofs ought to have been given, that the Church 
of Rome, after the schism of the churches, has 
remained as pure as at its origin, and that the 



APPENDIX. 



Eastern church has infringed upon some important 
and unchangeable law of the one holy catholic 
church. But as nothing has been said upon this 
point we pass on. In considering both churches at 
the time of their union, or rather, in considering the 
catholic (universal) church, in the first eight cen- 
turies, we find that to preserve its unity and inte- 
grity precisely and surely, she referred to a sacred 
law the following rule :—In general, orthodoxy in 
faith and in the canonical institution of the catholic 
(universal) church is attested by the word of God, 
by means of the general consent of the church and 
the fathers ; as to particular churches, they can 
themselves arrange their special matters, regarding 
only ecclesiastical discipline elsewhere ; but they 
must not be bold, otherwise the basis of Christianity 
would be shaken. Upon this sacred law were the 
oecumenical councils immovably based, which would 
not even have been convened had such a law had 
no existence. 

Let us now, then, go through all the eight cen- 
turies of the one holy catholic church, till the 
schism of the two churches took place, and let us 
look whether the sacred law of the catholic (univer- 
sal) church, of which we have just spoken, is still 
preserved ; if so, in which of the two churches 
which are no longer united together this law 
possesses all its force. 

On attentively looking at the Church of Kome 
we see there in the foreground a new creed put 
forth by the council which was convened at Trent, 



APPENDIX. 



391 



in Germany, in 1545, under Pope Paul III. \ a 
creed which not only departs from the faith it pro- 
fesses, but which is opposed, in almost every point, 
to the profession of the ancient catholic (universal) 
church, and to the sacred creed of the two first 
oecumenical conncils of Nicsea and Constantinople. 
After the unjustifiable addition (" filioque ") to an 
ancient divine doctrine which the Tridentine creed 
has made, in spite of the positive words of the 
Gospel which were uttered by Jesus Christ who 
is God, there follow in this creed much newt 
and unjustifiable doctrine ; — such strange ordi- 
nances as cannot even be traced in the ancient 
creed which deserves all our respect, but which 
are the work of a rash passion for innovation. 
The following are the innovations : 1. I acknow- 
ledge the true sacrament by which Jesus Christ is 
wholly received in one kind. 2. I believe in the 
power of indulgences to remit sin, a power bestowed 
upon the church by Jesus Christ, and I acknowledge 
that they have a wholesome use for mankind. 3. 
I promise absolute submission to the Pontiff of 
Rome, successor of St. Peter, and vicar of Jesus 
Christ • and this I swear, so help me Gocl ! 

Such are the innovations — such are the new 
articles of faith, — which, though opposed to the 
ancient creed, the Westerns have arbitrarily esta- 
blished, but which they, however, pretend were 
framed by an oecumenical council, as they falsely 
call that of Trent ; for they forgot, that from the 
time when Christians were divided into two distinct 



392 



APPENDIX. 



parties, there is no such tiling as an oecumenical 
council ; and no council can be called so which is 
not called together with the unanimous consent of 
the whole church : it follows, a fortiori, that Trent 
was not such a council even of the Western Church, 
because it was then troubled and shaken bj a violent 
storm — Luther having upset and rent it. The 
Eastern Church having seen the Western adopt 
such innovations, and, if we may be allowed to say 
so, depart from the ancient and sacred creed of the 
•orthodox faith, and from the doctrines set forth in 
the Word of God — doctrines that the Western 
Church had herself, together with, the Eastern, reve- 
renced and professed without the least alteration 
for upwards of eight centuries — the Eastern Church, 
we repeat, with its bishops, and all the orthodox, 
were in suspense in the presence of such facts ; she 
was surprised that the blessed pope, at a period of 
general disorder, should have determined to enter 
upon a matter of this kind — to bring back to com- 
munion with his see the Eastern Church, which 
from its origin to the present time, believes and 
celebrates the holy sacraments with unchangeable 
agreement and unanimity, which keeps the pure 
and sacred doctrines of divine faith, as she has 
received them, unchanged, untouched, unvarying, 
ever the same, and with no innovation. How 
could the Holy Father propose to a nation which 
was the first Pagan people to embrace Christianity 
— to abandon the traditions of the fathers, — which 
was first named after the name of Christ ; which 



APPENDIX. 



393 



suffered so much for her holy religion before the 
taking of Constantinople (as history, ever impartial, 
tells us), and which has had, afterwards, so much to 
undergo from Rome and her missionaries, who were 
sent, as was said, to propagate religion. These 
missionaries used all their efforts to unsettle the 
faith of this nation — its sacred heritage from the 
holy fathers : fallacies, false teaching, insinuating 
conversations, pamphlets, and even calumnies as at 
the present time, wrongs and expedients of every 
kind; — everything has been tried, and nothing has 
succeeded. The Westerns have tried in vain ; the 
nation of which we speak, in spite of all its vicissi- 
tudes, has remained firm in its belief : it has not 
overstepped the limits prescribed by the holy 
fathers : it has not submitted to any senseless 
addition to its holy doctrine ; on the contrary, it 
has preserved, firmly and unchangeably, the doc- 
trine and tradition of the Apostles, conformably 
to the canons and decrees made and issued under 
the guidance of the Holy Spirit, by the fathers of 
the East and West, at the seven oecumenical 
councils. 

The Eastern church, by her bishops and all the 
orthodox, has already sufficiently explained herself, 
when she w T as invited to abandon the holy creed, 
separate herself from the sacred doctrine, and 
adopt the doctrines of Rome, the innovations of 
Trent, which are opposed to the sacred creed, and 
which have separated the Western church not only 



394 



APPENDIX, 



from the Eastern, but also from the orthodox church 
of ancient Rome. In fine, an enormous chasm has 
been put between the two churches — between the 
Eastern church and her sister in times past, the 
Western church ; and it will remain as long as the 
innovations of the Church of Rome are unhealed, 
and especially on this addition ("filioque")? which is 
the worst of all : — as long, in fact, as that church, 
bj persisting in her innovations, remains irrecon- 
cilable to the orthodox church. 

At the end of his reply, the Eastern church im- 
plores our God and Lord Jesus Christ — her chief 
and the rock of her faith — to heal the wounds in- 
flicted on the Church of Rome by the evil spirit of 
dominion, to strengthen the enfeebled members of 
his body, the church, and to reanimate those who 
are on the point of falling away on account of 
cruel sufferings. Relying upon the Divine power 
of Jesus Christ, the orthodox church is deeply con- 
vinced, that out of his infinite mercy to the frailty 
of man, our Lord will work a miracle before all 
the world, by effecting a sound cure of the wounds 
with which the Church of Rome is aflicted, by 
giving life to her instead of death, union instead of 
dissension, one-sided discussions, reproaches, and 
slanders ; and finally, a perfect acquaintance with, 
and adoption of, the idea that the Holy Spirit had 
a personal existence from all eternity, from the 
Father. 

We cannot pass by in silence the circumstance 



APPENDIX. 



395 



that the Romans, when they bring arguments from 
the holy fathers, often confound the idea of the 
eternal procession of the Holy Spirit with the idea 
of His temporal mission, that is, with the super- 
natural gifts of the Holy Spirit, which emanated 
from the Father, and were distributed through the 
Son. Two different ideas are expressed by the 
two Greek wcrds ovala and viroaraais, which the 
ancient Latin fathers expressed by a single word — 
substantia. By this means the divines of the 
middle ages and of modern times confound two 
different ideas, and understand the substance 
(vTroaraa^) where the essence is referred to (ovala) 
and understood essence (ova-la), where the substance 
(viroaraais) is in question. The Eastern church 
believes and confesses that the Holy Spirit has the 
same essence (ovala) with the Father and the Son ; 
but says that, personally and hypostatically, 
(imoaTanaws) does not proceed from the Father 
and the Son, and rejects this innovation as an 
unfounded and blasphemous doctrine. Thus, the 
Westerns, by not clearly distinguishing between 
substance and essence (vTroaraais /cal ovala), depart 
from theological truth. Here is their whole differ- 
ence ; this produces their schism and disagreement 
with the Eastern church. 

May our God and Father — the eternal source of 
the peace of the world and of unanimity among 
men — reconcile the two churches (provided that the 
Romans, after mature deliberation, will reject what 
they imprudently adopted in spite of the universal 



396 APPENDIX. 

church) ; and may these churches, which of old 
were sisters, but are now divided by dissensions, be 
reunited together by the Holy Spirit, proceeding, in 
accordance with its external existence, from the 
Father only ! Amen. Amen. 



LONDON! BAXKIEON AND SONS, PRINTERS, 6T. I1AF.T1N b LANE. 




r o 

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